February 8, 2010

While the intent of this website is to comment on online & social marketing, there are times when an advertising campaign comes along that really knocks my socks off and restores my faith in the power of television advertising. 

The TV commercial I’m referring to is Google’s "Parisian Love" which aired during this past Superbowl Sunday.

Let’s face it, everyone knows or should know how to use Google.  Regardless, Google chose to spend $5 million for a TV spot to show the versatility and ease of their search engine in your everyday life.

In the time period of just 53 seconds, they were able to illustrate the simplicity of their features from…Did you mean, Maps, Web definitions, Language translation, Flight Tracking and Query suggestions.

This was a perfectly executed commercial and great timing on their end with Valentine Day right around the corner.  Think about it, are you going to be using Google to find a gift for your special Valentine? I know I'll be and this commercial will be playing in the back of my mind the whole time while I'm searching.

After watching their commerical a couple of more times online, I thought to myself “Why did they choose to air this commercial or more importantly pay the hefty price tag for a spot in the game?”  Out of left field it finally hit me and the answer was so simple I couldn't believe I didn’t think of it earlier, Microsoft’s Bing.

You might have noticed Microsoft has really beefed up the marketing for Bing and it’s starting to pay off.  According to Net Applications in January 2010,  Bing was the third largest search engine on the web with a query volume of 3.16%, after its competitor Google at 85.35% and Yahoo at 6.15%. 

I have used Bing a couple of times and it’s cool, but I have some weird sense of loyalty to Google.  Mainly because I’ve used it for years and it’s a staple in the online world nowadays as a majority of folks use Google versus other search engines.  Think about it, when was the last time you heard someone said “Hey I’ll Yahoo or AOL it!”  I personally can’t even remember the last time I have used either of the two.

My prediction for 2010 is this battle between Google and Bing is just getting started as both companies are going to be spending millions in advertising "i.e. Radio, TV, Print and Online" to convince you their search engine is better and it's going to be interesting to see who comes out on top.

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