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An Overview of Google and Its Components

Jacob You

Moorpark College

BUS M30: Introduction to Business

Ms. Anafe Robinson

July 23, 2021

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An Overview of Google and Its Components

When we think of looking up information, we tend to think of Google, the search engine

that millions of people easily recognize and use worldwide. Whenever we have questions, we

immediately head to our devices and “google” the questions we want to know. The worldwide

spread and fame of this company, as well as its constant use in our daily lives, is what led me to

research Google. This massive tech giant started from very humble beginnings. In 1995, in the

dorm room of two Stanford students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin. The two students partnered up

to create Google, a small search engine, in hopes of eventually organizing the world’s

information and using it (Google, n.d. -a). Google began to grow, catching the attention of

Silicon Valley investors, eventually receiving $100,000 from angel investor Andy Bechtolsheim.

After moving over to its current headquarters location at Mountain View, CA, the company

would eventually grow into a massive tech giant, branching out in many different directions.

As of now, Google is a limited liability company that is involved in many different

tech-related industries, such as the Internet, cloud computing, computer software and hardware,

AI, and advertising. Due to its wide variety of industries, Google has an extremely long product

mix, with product lines ranging from software like Google Drive to hardware such as Google

Home. To go more in detail, Google provides mostly convenience products and services,

primarily web services. Products such as Google Docs, Gmail, Google Ads, Stadia, and Youtube,

all fall under the tech giant’s massive umbrella of products. Most of these products are virtually

free and are often used out of habit or preference. Google also sells several primarily hardware

shopping products, including the Google Pixel, the Chromebook, and Nest (Wikipedia, 2021).

Most of Google’s products are either in the late growth or early maturity stages of their product

life. For example, Youtube is an extremely popular video-sharing platform that is continuing to
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grow, assisted even further due to the COVID-19 pandemic, allowing users to find information

and entertainment from the comfort of their device (Aslam, 2021). Other products such as Gmail

or Google Drive are also thriving, with Gmail being the most popular email platform with over

1.8 billion users worldwide (TechJury, 2021), and Google Drive having almost 2 billion users

(Karthick n.d.). Google’s hardware products like the Pixel and Nest used to primarily be based in

China, but due to recent trade wars with the country, COVID-19, and other factors, Google has

started to shift development to Vietnam, where labor is still rather cheap.

Having such a wide range of products means that Google also has many different

competitors. For example, a large and growing competitor to Google’s advertising services is

Facebook with 22.1% of all digital ad dollars spent in the US as of 2019, catching up to Google’s

37.2%. Competing with Google’s video-sharing industry is TikTok, a rapidly growing social

media and video-sharing platform with downloads rising around 400% in a year. However,

Youtube is still much more widely used and is more focused on long-form content rather than

TikTok’s short clips. Youtube is also competing with Instagram, where Instagram makes up

6.47% of the global social media market share, while YouTube has only 3.28%. However,

Youtube still has around 1.9 billion monthly active users, whereas Instagram has only 1 billion

monthly active users. In the smartphone industry, Apple is dominating the market, with a global

smartphone market share of 22.87% and over 217 million iPhones in 2018, much higher than

Google’s 4.7 million. However, Google’s Android operating system makes up almost 75% of the

mobile operating system market, beating Apple at only 22%. Lastly, in the search engine market,

Google holds a strong lead with 93% of the worldwide market, leaving Yahoo and Bing behind

at only 2.3% and 1.4%. Aside from these major companies, Google still has plenty of other

competitors from Tesla to Amazon (Sivakumar, 2019).

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To organize the products and management of this massive tech giant, Google is organized

using a combination of product and functional departmentalization. The company is split into

many different groups, all focused on separate sections of products, from working on Google

Cloud to updating the Android OS. Additionally, Google is split into different functional

departments, containing groups such as a sales operations group, an engineering and design

group, a product management group, and many more (Smithson, 2019). Due to having such a

broad range of products, Google does not strictly use any specific market segmentation

techniques. Most of their products are aimed at a generally young, middle to upper-class

individuals familiar with technology. Aside from a few countries such as China where Google

has restricted access, Google reaches markets from all over the globe (Bhattacharya, 2016).

However, certain subsections of Google do practice different types of segmentation. For

example, Youtube recently released Youtube Kids, an example of psychographic segmentation,

with Youtube Kids being targeted at a much younger audience than Youtube. Additionally,

Youtube also released Youtube Music, an example of benefit segmentation, where Youtube

Music is targeted towards people who use Youtube primarily for music, whereas Youtube is

generally used for both video sharing and music purposes.

Google does not have a code of ethics but has generally used the term “don’t be evil” to

express their values in a very short, but meaningful way (Carbone, 2018). This statement can be

seen in many parts of their processes and actions, including Google’s programs and activities to

fight climate change. For example, Google has been carbon neutral since 2007 and aims to be

carbon-free by 2030. Google also has partnered up with many organizations such as nonprofits,

research organizations, governments, and businesses to develop new technology to stop climate

change (Google, n.d. -b). In addition to climate change, Google is also focused on global public
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health and global poverty, setting up charity programs that have given more than $100 million in

grants and investments. Google also emphasizes the importance of diversity, equity, and

inclusion, even having an Equity Programs Team to ensure parity throughout the company

(Google Diversity, n.d.). Google is currently hiring, with a wide variety of different jobs ranging

from being an account manager, an editor, or a test engineer (Indeed, n.d.). Many Google jobs

are well-paying with many helpful benefits including many different kinds of insurance,

maternity and paternity leave, discounts on products, and many more (Levels.fyi, n.d.).

If I was in charge of the marketing department for Google, I would utilize our many

commonly used applications such as the Google search engine and Youtube as well as our

advertising department to try and promote Google products as already owning these extremely

popular applications would make advertising extremely cheap and easy. For example, Google

could implement colorful and intriguing advertisements and put them on the homepage of

Youtube, attracting millions of people. Once we identify our target market, I would use data that

Google automatically gathers from users to develop personalized ads towards certain

demographics, helping us better reach key consumers. Overall, putting in these ads and videos

would help us build more interest in our products, and would also help us reach more consumers

and convince them to use our services. We could measure the success of these plans by looking

at the average monthly sales and user base for our advertised products and services, and analyze

over time whether sales and usage increase over time. Overall, Google is an extremely

influential company in the world today, owning and developing many of the iconic technologies

that we use daily.

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References

Aslam, S. (2021, July 8). YouTube by the Numbers: Stats, Demographics & Fun Facts.

Omnicore. https://www.omnicoreagency.com/youtube-statistics/.

Bhattacharya, M. (2016). Find Target Market of Google Inc.. Management Learning.

Carbone, C. (2018, May 22). Google revises code of conduct, removes 'Don't be evil'. New York

Post.

https://nypost.com/2018/05/22/google-revises-code-of-conduct-removes-dont-be-evil/.

Google Diversity. (n.d.). Google Diversity Report. Google Diversity. https://diversity.google/.

Google. (n.d. -a). Google Sustainability. https://sustainability.google/.

Google. (n.d. -b). How we started and where we are today. Google.

https://about.google/our-story/.

Indeed. (n.d.). Google Jobs. Google Jobs and Careers.

https://www.indeed.com/cmp/Google/jobs.

Karthick. (n.d.). Google drive – 18 Amazing Stats and Facts. HelloLeads Blog.

https://www.helloleads.io/blog/stats-facts/google-drive-18-amazing-stats-and-facts/.

Levels.fyi. (n.d.). Google Company Perks & Benefits. Levels.fyi.

https://www.levels.fyi/company/Google/benefits/.
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Meyer, P. (2017, January 28). Google Stakeholders & Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

Panmore Institute.

http://panmore.com/google-stakeholders-corporate-social-responsibility-csr-analysis.

Sivakumar, B. (2019, December 9). The 12 Biggest Competitors Of Google. Feedough.

https://www.feedough.com/12-biggest-competitors-google/.

Smithson, N. (2019, February 13). Google's Organizational Structure & Organizational Culture

(An Analysis). Panmore Institute.

http://panmore.com/google-organizational-structure-organizational-culture.

Staff, V. (2018, September 5). Google turns 20: how an internet search engine reshaped the

world. The Verge.

https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/5/17823490/google-20th-birthday-anniversary-history-

milestones.

TechJury. (2021, July 7). 52 Gmail Statistics That Show How Big It Actually Is In 2021.

TechJury. https://techjury.net/blog/gmail-statistics/#gref.

Wikimedia Foundation. (2021, July 19). Google. Wikipedia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google.