Google has expanded internationally over the past decade through representative offices and partnerships in over 144 countries. It holds a 60% global market share for search and has more market share in Europe than the US. Google aims to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible through culturally relevant applications in many languages. It has acquired over 50 companies to extend its services and now has major presences in India, Europe, Latin America, and other regions through offices and local partnerships.
2. International Markets
Google is one of the most used search engines in the world, offered in
approximately 144 countries. The search engine holds around a 60% market share in the
world’s search engine requests. While Google originated in the United States, it holds a
10% higher market share in Europe than in the United States (Chardonneau). Google,
Inc. has approximately twenty American based offices, thirteen offices in the Asia-
Pacific region, twenty-six offices in Europe, three offices in Canada, three offices in
Latin America, and five offices in the Middle East (“Corporate Information…”). Google,
Inc.’s president and cofounder, Sergey Brin, said in May of 2000, “Google plans to
quickly expand into a wide variety of new markets. The simplicity of our user interface
and the scalability of our back-end systems enables us to expand very quickly.” (“Google
Goes…”). With approximately 70 office locations as of April 2010 in the United States
and around the world, Google, Inc. is swiftly becoming a noticeable global brand.
Located below is a non exhaustive list of Google’s abroad activities:
1999: First non engineer employee hired
2000: Google provides an interface in several languages – French, German, Italian,
Swedish, Finnish, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Norwegian, Danish, Chinese, Japanese
and Korean
2001: Google is now available in 26 languages and has opened its first international
office in Tokyo. A partnership with Universo Online (UOL) (the largest online service
and internet provider in Latin America) makes Google the major search service for
millions of Latin Americans.
2002: Google is available in 72 languages, partnership with AOL and First Office in
Sydney, Australia
2003: Several national acquisitions extend Google’s services abroad. Dublin becomes
the first location for Google’s regional operations outside of the U.S.
2004: More than 100 Google domain names are available. Google opens new engineering
offices in Bangalore and Hyderabad, India. R&D center opened in Tokyo.
2005: Google Maps application is released for Europe. New R&D center opens in China
as well as the first offices in Mexico and Argentina open.
2006: Several other acquisitions extend their services with translation in several different
languages
3. 2007: Partnership with China Mobile (the world’s largest mobile telecommunications
carrier) to provide mobile and internet search services in China. Partnerships signed to
give free access to Google Apps for education to 70,000 university students in Kenya and
Rwanda.
2008: Series of even more acquisitions for Google services
*This list is a summarization of a more in-depth analysis found in the resource
“International Marketing Google,” By Roman Chardonneau.
International Strategy
In over a ten year span Google has developed international marketing structures to
establish a presence in more than 144 countries. These range from simply
representational offices to complex partnerships with existing companies in foreign
countries. The simple fact that Google’s mission statement is to “organize the world’s
information and make it universally accessible and useful” shows the companies intent to
be a Global brand, not just a brand recognizable only in English speaking countries
(“Google Apps Goes…”). While the list of language specific Google applications is too
long to completely list, the extent to which Google provides culturally relevant
applications is a mark of their international marketing genius. Realizing a need for a
global internet media provider, Google has taken on more than 50 companies to “extend
their range of service which would then be translated in order to be internationally
exportable” (Chardonneau). While not all of Google’s internet media applications are
available in all the foreign markets they have a presence in, Sanjay Raman, the Google
Apps product manager, realizes the extent to which the internet is not dominated by
English speaking users. Raman states, “The global focus is critical, because fully 65% of
internet users around the world speak a language other than English. In fact, the
internet’s top 10 languages still only account for around 85% of users- and the remaining
15% represents almost 200 million people” (“Google Apps Goes…”). It is safe to
assume that Google is a globally recognized brand. Co-founders Larry Page and Sergey
Brin, have been adamant in Google press releases that they intend to continue their
expanse into foreign markets to provide a fully satisfying internet experience to the entire
world.
4. Works Cited
Chardonneau, Roman. “International Marketing Google.” Slideshare.net, Web. <http://
www.slideshare.net/Nanor/international-marketing-google-1401312> 31 March 2010.
“Corporate Information: Google Offices.” Google.com, Web. 2010.
<http://www.google.com/corporate/address.html>
“Google Apps Goes Global.” Blogspot.com, Web. 31 July 2007.
<http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/07/google-apps-goes-global.html> 29
March 2010.
“Google Goes Global with Addition of 10 Languages.” Google.com, Web. 9 May 2000.
<http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/pressrelease22.html> 31 March 2010.
Works Consulted
“Google Apps now South of the Sahara.” Blogspot.com, Web. 19 March 2007. <http://
googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/03/google-apps-now-south-of-s ahara.html> 29 March
2010.
“Google Becomes Premier Search Engine for Latin America.” Google.com, Web.
1 October 2001. <http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/uol.html> 30 March
2010.
“Google in Chinia.” Blogspot.com, Web. 27 January 2006.
<http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/01/google-in-china.html> 29 March 2010.
“Google Launches New Japanese, Chinese, and Korean Search Services.” Google.com,
Web. 12 September 2000.
<http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/pressrelease34.html> 30 March 2010.
“Picasa X 25.” Blogspot.com, Web. 30 January 2006.
<http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/01/picasa-x-25_30.html> 29 March 2010.