Aug 13, 2012 at 11:36am ET by Greg Sterling

Google has done nothing illegal. Just the same some British Members of Parliament (MPs) are angry and will likely call company executives (probably Eric Schmidt) to testify about why Google doesn't pay its "fair share" of taxes in the UK. According to published reports and company filings Google made £395 million ($620 million) in revenues in the UK in 2011 but paid £6 million ($9.5 million) in taxes. That works out to be about 1.5 percent of revenue. According to a story in the UK Independent, some MPs and members of the public are upset by what they see as unfair tax avoidance. This [...]

Are The Analysts Wrong About Google’s Undervalued Stock?

Jul 24, 2012 at 9:30am ET by Andy Atkins-Krüger

Writers and analysts who keep an eye on the value of certain stocks, have been writing all year about the curious phenomenon of Google's stock price. They generally say something along the lines of, "If you compare Google's cash generation capabilities, why is it valued so much less than Apple?" or similar statements. Is it true that Google is undervalued or, in fact, might the lower than expected stock price be due to none other than Google itself? If you read this column regularly, you'll know that generally, as Google releases its performance figures each quarter, I like to break them [...]

On Google Earnings Call, Google Ignores FTC Definition Of “Paid Inclusion”

Jul 19, 2012 at 6:01pm ET by Danny Sullivan

On its earnings call today, an analyst asked Google about the new paid inclusion model for Google Shopping. The analyst got corrected. Google doesn't call what it's doing paid inclusion, he was told. That's because Google is comfortable continuing to ignore the US Federal Trade Commission's definition of what "paid inclusion" is. It's yet another example that the search engine industry doesn't really care about the FTC's search engine guidelines. Definitions? We Don't Need No Stinkin' FTC Definitions I'll update this story with the extended quote after the earnings transcript goes live later [...]

As The Yahoo-Microsoft Search Alliance Falls Short, Could A Yahoo-Google Deal Emerge?

Jul 19, 2012 at 9:00am ET by Danny Sullivan

Once again, Yahoo is earning so little under its search deal with Microsoft that Microsoft is having to make up the difference due to a revenue guarantee. If the performance doesn't improve, Yahoo might go looking for a new partner, which could include Google. Let's explore how the deal has continued to falter, quarter-after-quarter, and how the seemingly inevitable failure might lead Yahoo back to one-time partner Google. The RPS Gap During its earnings call this week, Yahoo chief financial officer Tim Morse said there continues to be a gap between the expected revenue earned per search [...]

Ironically, Search Might Be Less A Priority At Yahoo As Google’s Marissa Mayer Takes The Helm

Jul 16, 2012 at 6:11pm ET by Danny Sullivan

Wow. Wow. Wow. That's all that keeps running through my head as I digest the news that long-time Google executive Marissa Mayer is to take over as president and CEO of Yahoo. Smart move for Mayer. Smart move for Yahoo. And as I'll explain more, perhaps a move that finally takes Yahoo out of the search game, but takes it out in a smart way. A Force To Be Reckoned With I've known Mayer since she started at Google in 1999. Until she moved off of being vice president of search in 2010, Mayer was the Google executive I had the most contact with. When we were first introduced, my reaction to Googl [...]

Why Apple Is Going “Containment” Not “Thermonuclear” Against Google In iOS 6

Jun 14, 2012 at 9:00am ET by Danny Sullivan

I keep hearing people talking about Apple finally going "thermonuclear" on Google with the forthcoming iOS 6 mobile operating system. No, it hasn't. In fact, there are good reasons why it can't, though Apple is certainly exercising a much more subtle and smart containment strategy. Themonuclearly Renewing With Google The thermonuclear reference comes from the Steve Jobs biography written by Walter Isaacson, where Jobs was so upset about Google's Android operating system -- and the theft from Apple that he viewed it to be -- that he said to Issacson in early 2010: I’m going to destroy Andr [...]

Google Grows Revenues 24% From Last Year, Plans New Class Of Stock

Apr 12, 2012 at 5:26pm ET by Pamela Parker

Google's revenues rose to $10.65 billion in the first quarter of 2012, resulting in net income of $2.89 billion, or $8.75 per share, the company announced after market close today. The revenue number represents a 24% increase over the year-ago period. Additionally, the board of directors proposed the creation of a new class of non-voting shares -- to be distributed as a dividend to all current shareholders -- effectively resulting in an two for one stock split. "We had a very strong quarter," said CEO Larry Page on a conference call with press and analysts, "Since becoming CEO again, I have [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Google: Business Issues | Top News

Page To Anti-Trust Critics: “Actions” & Google+ Are An Essential Part Of Search

Apr 7, 2012 at 9:00am ET by Danny Sullivan

Google's taken flak over the past year from critics about how the company has been integrating actions such as booking flights or hotels into its search results. It's also faced criticisms that it is leveraging its search dominance to build its Google+ social network. I found it notable that Google CEO Larry Page, in his "2012 Update from the CEO" letter, essentially pushed back against both criticisms. Page doesn't say he's attacking these criticisms in the update. That's my own reading between-the-lines. But nothing in the letter would have been presented without a good reason. I think [...]

Looking Back At Larry Page’s First Year At Google’s Helm

Apr 4, 2012 at 3:02pm ET by Greg Sterling

Two articles appeared today that reflect on the first year of Larry Page's return to the CEO role at Google. Bloomberg's Brad Stone does a Q&A with Page in which he discusses the larger competitive challenges Google faces and some of his management philosophy. The other piece is from Wired writer Steven Levy and is a bit of a counterpoint to the mostly upbeat Bloomberg story. Stone declines to query Page about privacy, antitrust and Google's myriad problems with regulators and governments around the world. In his answers about a range of issues, Page is confident and seemingly reflectiv [...]

Report: Google Makes $10 Per Android User Per Year

Mar 29, 2012 at 1:40pm ET by Greg Sterling

An analysis performed by UK publication The Guardian on court documents filed in the patent litigation between Google and Oracle suggests that Google has made less on Android handsets than from the iPhone. The court documents are part of a settlement proposal filed in the case. There's no overt discussion of revenues in the documents. Instead there are some potential damages figures from which The Guardian has extrapolated Google revenue numbers. NOTE: See our own follow-up analysis, No, Google Doesn’t Make Four Times More Off The iPhone Vs. Android The publication reports "Android genera [...]

Video: Google’s Susan Wojcicki Keynotes SMX West 2012

Mar 17, 2012 at 9:34am ET by Matt McGee

Susan Wojcicki, Google's SVP of Advertising, spoke at our recent SMX West search marketing conference in a keynote conversation with Search Engine Land's Danny Sullivan and Chris Sherman. The conversation covered many different topics -- not just the advertising side of Google where Susan is most heavily involved -- from privacy issues to mobile marketing to how Google started in Wojcicki's garage. While we already provided coverage of the keynote via Greg Sterling's live blog of the conversation, we also have several video clips that our readers may have missed -- and that attendees may wa [...]

Live Blogging the Google (Susan Wojcicki) SMX West Keynote

Feb 29, 2012 at 11:54am ET by Greg Sterling

Danny Sullivan, Chris Sherman and Google SVP of Advertising Susan Wojcicki are now seated for her on-stage keynote interview this morning at SMX West. It's a capacity crowd as Chris Sherman introduces Wojcicki as "one of the 50 most influential business executives" (Forbes). He also characterizes her as someone "you may not have heard of at Google." Chris then leads off with a humorous slide-show of famous garages in Silicon Valley and beyond: HP, Apple, Google, Walt Disney and Amazon. Now the serious part begins. (The dialogue below is paraphrased.) The Early Days Chris: When [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Search | Google | Google: Business Issues | Top News

“Googler Killer”, Cuil, Patent Applications Acquired By Google

Feb 20, 2012 at 3:24pm ET by Barry Schwartz

Googler Killer, Cuil, which launched in June 2008 and went defunct in September 2010, have had their patent applications acquired by Google. Bill Slawski spotted the transfer of ownership of these patent applications this morning. The patents transfer to Google from Cuil include 20090240672, 20090240685, 20090241044, 20090241018, 20090241058, 20090241065 and 20090241066. This is not all that surprising, being that one of the co-founders, Anna Patterson joined Google the same month Cuil went offline. Related Stories: Cuil Goes Offline, Future Not So Cool Anna Patterson, Cuil Found [...]

Microsoft Security Patch Marked Google.com As Malware

Feb 16, 2012 at 10:05am ET by Barry Schwartz

Some of those who use Microsoft security software received a security patch a couple days ago that lead to malware warnings for users trying to visit Google.com. Softpedia posted a picture of the warning. Microsoft quickly learned about the issue on their support forums and issued a patch yesterday to address the issue. Microsoft didn't explain it was a Google specific issue but said: On February 14, 2012, an incorrect detection for Exploit:JS/Blacole.BW was introduced. On February 14, 2012, Microsoft released an update that addresses the issue. Signature versions 1.119.1988.0 and high [...]

Matt Cutts Convinces Some South Korean Govt. Websites To Stop Blocking Googlebot

Jan 31, 2012 at 4:11pm ET by Matt McGee

Matt Cutts, international diplomat? That might be the more appropriate title for Google's chief spam cop. According to the Wall Street Journal, Cutts is in South Korea this week and, in a presentation Monday night for about 80 government officials, webmasters, lawyers and journalists, managed to singlehandedly convince some government reps to let Googlebot crawl and index their websites. One of those in the audience was Kang Min-koo, a senior judge in the Seoul High Court. When he saw the court's Web site was on Mr. Cutts' list of government sites that couldn't be indexed by Google – and [...]

A Proposal For Social Network Détente

Jan 23, 2012 at 10:15pm ET by Danny Sullivan

For the past two weeks, I feel like I've been witnessing some type of Cuban Missile Crisis going on between Google, Twitter and Facebook. I'd like to suggest some ways that social-nuclear war might be averted. Beyond Blame, Believing In Cooperation Let's set aside blame, because blame isn't going to move anything forward. Let's also assume that all the players can be taken to some degree at their word, that they do indeed want to work together in some ways. What does everyone want? The Wants & A Game Changer Google has wanted its own social graph for some time. By social graph, I [...]

Google: Paid Clicks Up 34% While Cost Per Click Down 8% YoY

Jan 19, 2012 at 4:40pm ET by Barry Schwartz

Google just posted their Q4 2011 earnings resulting in a massive quarter but not meeting expectations of investors. In fact, Google's stock is down over 9% in after hours trading. That being said, part of those earning results showed that paid clicks on Google's network is up 34% year over year but cost per click (CPC) is down 8% year over year. In other words, more people are clicking on ads, but those clicks are costing advertisers less money per click. The paid clicks also increased from Q3 to Q4 by 17%, while CPC dropped 8% from Q3 to Q4. Paid Clicks – Aggregate paid clicks, [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Google: Business Issues

Class Action Lawsuit Against Google For Ads On Parked Domains Turned Down

Jan 9, 2012 at 9:27am ET by Barry Schwartz

paidContent reports the lawsuit brought against Google in 2008 over quality of ads showing on parked or error message web pages has been thrown out by the court. On Thursday, January 5th, U.S. District Judge Edward Davila turned down the class action suit brought against Google. He said he would not allow the suit because "it was more appropriate for companies who had bought the ads to show any alleged harm on an individual basis," according to paidContent. Here is the 25-page court document with the ruling: Google Parked Domain Class Actionvar docstoc_docid="110404116";var docstoc_t [...]

Larry Page “CEO Of The Year” — Investors Business Daily

Jan 2, 2012 at 10:10am ET by Greg Sterling

When Larry Page took over the CEO role at Google last year the company was doing well. Now it's doing better and so Investor's Business Daily has named him "CEO of the Year." The publication summed up its rationale as follows: [Page] reorganized the company's management structure, redesigned the face of the company's products and pushed forward with a multibillion dollar deal to acquire a cellphone manufacturing outfit. He also launched two other products aiming at Groupon, the leader of online coupons, and Facebook, the top social networking site. Google (GOOG) in the past two quarters [...]

Google Sued By buySAFE Over Trusted Stores Program

Dec 28, 2011 at 9:07am ET by Barry Schwartz

TechCrunch reports a company named buySafe is suing Google over their Trusted Stores program, which Google launched in October. buySafe claims several strong things in this law suit: (1) Patent Infringement (2) Stealing proprietary business information (3) Pushing buySafe customers to switch to Google Trusted Stores (4) Google is trying to squash the company from growing (5) Google had interest in partnering with buySafe since 2006 (6) Google obtained confidential customer information from a former buySafe customer and current Google Trusted Stores Group Product Manager (7) Google [...]

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