So What's Google Been Up To?

Since I told you about Amazon yesterday, I thought we'd talk about Google today.

Lots going on in Google World and the Birmingham [England] Post (BP) is all over it.

The BP reports that Google is about "to combine its online search services into one 'Universal Search' that will present web sites, news, video and other results on one page."

The story quotes an analyst with Global Crown Capital saying, "The thing everyone is wondering right now is what will an advertiser be willing to pay for a video link."

Google has spent years building "silos of information." Their plan is to integrate these various databases for news, video clips, books, local information and images.

The company is also readying a translation service that "will translate queries in any of a dozen languages into English, find additional search results, then automatically translate those back into the language of the original query. This will give users in any supported language a broader view of information on the web."

Now when you search on Google, you'll be able to pull up relevant video clips from YouTube, Google Video and independent sites like Metacafe.com. Advertisers are going to love it.

In a second story, the BP has this to say:

Google's relentless march to take over the world has been well documented in this column. It's always amusing to see which industry Google is going to take apart next--that is until you find out it's the one you're in!

Its recent acquisition of DoubleClick signals its intention [to] get into traditional advertising.

DoubleClick represents a departure from Google's text advertising approach. According to BP, Doubleclick "controls one of the largest networks of banner ad space, using the network of independent sites that allow it a traditional 'display' advertising model, where brands pay for their graphical ads to be pasted on websites, like posters on billboards."

Display advertising is attractive to Internet users because it doesn't require them to click away from whatever site they are viewing when they see the ad. Web surfers are notoriously stingy about giving up their clicks to advertisers.

It will be interesting to see what Google's latest moves do to the advertising world.