There’s no denying that Google is a lot of fun. You can use it to find out anything about everything. Elephant polo (a personal hobby)? It’s on there. The Baja 1000 off-road race? Also a hobby, and also on there. Like I said, anything about everything.
But if you are in any way engaged in marketing on the internet, Google is a money machine—the ultimate cash cow. By far the king of search engines, Google accounts for more than two thirds of all internet searches. (In April of 2008, the exact number was 67.9%.) Obviously, if you’re spending dollars advertising online, knowing who’s getting the biggest bite of the search engine usage stats is critical information to have.
Digging a little deeper into the Google stats is mind-blowing. In a typical month, Google will process almost 17 billion (not a typo—17 billion) search requests, launched by over 200 million (again, not a typo—200 million) people. That works out to about 80 searches per month per person. And when you consider that right now over 70% of the North American population has access to the internet, the sheer size and magnitude of the Google cash machine becomes evident.
In CarbonCopyPRO, 50-60% of all leads come from Google, most of these through the Urban Cowgirl’s Google Goldmining techniques. These are high-quality leads, specifically targeted and the most qualified of any of our lead sources. We’ve managed some impressive numbers since I launched the business four years ago, and I would have to credit Google and how we leverage it for much of that growth.
Even now as people are worrying more and more about the economy, Google is as strong as ever, getting stronger, and we continue to grow as well. One of the problems a lot of people seem to have when they think about incorporating Google into their marketing mix is that they tend to think small.
To fully exploit all of the opportunities that Google offers, an internet marketer has to come to grips with just how vast it really is—there has never been a better way to get a marketing message in front of billions of people so cost effectively. Google is huge, and offers plenty of opportunities for anyone. It’s an incredibly powerful lead factory that services the most dynamic and expansive marketplace that mankind has ever created. Don’t forget though that you have to pay to play. To actively and aggressively tap into the resources that Google offers, you will need to spend some money. As a point of reference, in the last four years I’ve personally invested over $250,000 in Google marketing to promote my personal businesses. And it’s been worth every penny. In fact my average ROI from Google is well over 500%. Think about it… its almost like printing money☺
The key is to understand how Google operates, and then figure out how it will best serve your business. For example, the Google Adsense product is a great place to get your ads on other, relevant websites, as well as to make additional money from your own. The Adsense content crawler literally covers millions of websites, as well as Gmail. What’s really crazy is that Google itself is only 10 years old, after its incorporation in September of 1998. It’s pretty obvious that I’m a big fan of Google—don’t forget, though, that I’m a pretty good customer too.
