New & exciting google from across the globe | Marketing Mag

Google ad revenue rebounds to buck trend

Ned Lupson — Wed, 26 Jul 2023 05:02:55 +0000

Although there is a perception that corporate belts are being tightened across the board, Google ad revenue has managed to surpass expectations. The company announced its strong results of Q2 to shareholders this week, with advertising revenue up 3.3 percent after slumping recently.

“There’s exciting momentum across our products and the company, which drove strong results this quarter,” says Sundar Pichai, the CEO of Alphabet and Google.

“Our continued leadership in AI and excellence in engineering and innovation are driving the next evolution of Search, and improving all our services.”

What restricted budgets?

In a harsh economic climate this is an unexpected announcement, with marketing and advertising spending an early victim.

Recent data from Australian-born payments company Airwallex recorded domestic ad spend plummeting, with a 16 percent drop in a year and nearly a $2 billion decline in the Australian advertising industry.

But for Google, 2023 is proving to be a rebound year after share prices fell throughout 2022. The company report for Q2 shows that it took US$74.6 billion in revenue, beating expectations, as YouTube ad revenue rose to US$7.66 billion from US$7.34 last year. The results cast doubt upon forecasts of extreme declines in advertising spending.

“Our financial results reflect continued resilience in Search, with an acceleration of revenue growth in both Search and YouTube,” says Alphabet chief financial officer Ruth Porat.

The company will be encouraged by rival results. Despite a strong return on its investment in AI, Microsoft took a hit with a poor result from the second quarter of 2023 and share prices falling.

Google announces CFO to take on new role

Amongst the slate of Alphabet updates was the news of a new executive position for the current CFO, with Porat to be president and chief investment officer of Alphabet and Google from 1 September.

“I’m excited about this new role and the opportunity to engage with leaders globally to unlock economic growth via technology and investment,” says Porat in a statement.

“I’m committed to Google’s continued growth and ensuring that our diverse global investments are supported with strong partnership to create opportunities for people and communities everywhere.”

Read more about Google’s advertising updates by checking out its crackdown on ad-blocking software for YouTube.

‘Wordle’ – the most trending search on Google this year

Benay Ozdemir — Thu, 08 Dec 2022 00:13:32 +0000

Google’s top trends have been revealed, showcasing the most popular queries and curiosities Aussies were searching throughout the year.

The search engine trends reveal a lot about 2022 – word games, weather warnings and war. Google searches allow people to explore what went through our minds during the year. ‘Wordle’ has been crowned as the most searched on Google in Australia this year. The word game gained popularity over the course of the year, as many opted to use the search engine to directly access the website.

Aussies have been through natural disasters and crises, with results reflecting the tough year. Communities in Australia have been hit with floods, with searches including ‘floods’, ‘La Niña’, and ‘when will the rain stop’. Google has outlined that search interest about floods in Australia increased more than 200 percent compared with previous years, with La Niña’s interest topping over 80 percent. Other natural disasters that were popular to search for were the Tonga volcano eruption and tsunami warnings. The war in Ukraine featured in the overall top five search trends in Australia. Interest peaked in February as the war broke out, as Western Australia searched ‘Ukraine latest’ the most.

Health searches

After years of lockdown, COVID-19-related topics stuck around, but also expanded to include searches for Monkeypox and Japanese encephalitis. The most searched questions were, ‘how do you get monkeypox’ and ‘symptoms of monkeypox’. As the Omicron variant lingers in Australia, people were searching ‘how long for omicron symptoms to show’ and ‘difference between delta and omicron’.

The top ten for news events of 2022:

Ukraine
Election results
Omicron symptoms
Monkeypox
Tonga
Tsunami warning
Novavax Australia
Cassius Turvey
Covid update Perth
Japanese encephalitis

Google trends allows us to giggle over the “Why Is…..?” questions.

Why is Russia invading Ukraine
Why is plain yoghurt good for females
Why is petrol so expensive
Why is lettuce so expensive
Why is there a lettuce shortage
Why is diesel so expensive
Why is crypto going down
Why is Camilla queen consort
Why is Australia not part of NATO
Why is Snapchat not working

Aussies’ national love for sport

As the World Cup dominates sports news, surprisingly the Australian Open was the most searched sport. Tennis was once again on our minds as Djokovic, Nadal and Medvedev topped the global figures list. Australia’s very own tennis champion, Ash Barty topped the trending Australian individual in 2022.

Australian Open
World Cup
Ashes
Winter Olympics
Rugby League World Cup
Indian Wells
Commonwealth Games
ATP Cup
AFLW
NBL

Google launches a AR-powered shopping tool

Benay Ozdemir — Fri, 18 Nov 2022 05:45:17 +0000

As the AR technology starts dominating the meta space, Google has launched a new AR-powered shopping tool that will allow buyers to see the shoes they’re looking at from a 360 degree view.

This is a similar tool that shoppers use for home goods, allowing users to fit a couch in their space or objects to see the dimensions of the product.

Instead, this tool will allow buyers to spin, zoom, see the shoes around them and decide if the style, colour, laces, platform, heels of the shoe fits the buyer’s style. One thing that buyers cannot do, is try the shoes on.

Brands in partnership with Google are Saucony, VANS and Merrell and Google has stated that any brand with 3D assets can join the crew for their shoes to be shown in AR.

The operator said that shoppers will be able to engage with 3D imagery 50 percent more than with static images highlighting it as a huge opportunity for brands. The tech giant also said that it will invest in new software that will allow brands and retailers to create 3D models with only a few static images – no need for the hundreds.

Get the right shade of foundation as Google includes the beauty industry in its AR tool

That’s right – no need to stress about getting your foundation colour wrong as Google optimises its service to the beauty industry. Google has announced that a skin tone-matching feature will make it easier for shoppers finding the right shade of foundation.

So how will this work?

Google has worked with multiple beauty brands and created a cloud that has over 140 models representing a “diverse spectrum of skin tones, ages, genders, face shapes, ethnicities and skin types.”

Shoppers will be able to use this feature by searching for a foundation on Google and view what it may look like on models with a similar skin tone. Pictures of their before and after will allow the user to pick a retailer to buy the foundation from.

This is really changing the makeup game when it comes to buying online as 60 percent of buyers have decided to not purchase a beauty product online as they did not know what shade they were. Following this, 41 percent have said they decided to return an item as it was the wrong shade.