It all started earlier this week, when I came across this article on TechCrunch. The article asked what happened to the free version of Google apps. I thought that something like that was to be expected, as Google was probably waiting from the start for a sufficient number of people start using its services. That is, it waited for scale to happen, and to ripe the benefits of network effect (usefulness of a service increases as more people are using it. A cell phone or a fax machine or an email is pretty useless if you are the only person in the world who has it.) So, anyway, that was my initial thought: now that some of the google services are so widely used that they are close to irreplaceable (at least in people's minds) they would not mind paying for it. Which Google counts on.
That would be the end of the story if I didn't send that article to Noah, who - as it turned out - was himself thinking about Google's market strategy. Then Jeff Jarvis post surfaced the next day, and all of the sudden the question of what Google is exactly doing became [somewhat] interesting to me. While I tend to agree with Nick Carr and with Noah that, roughly put, Google's business is to get people to use internet more (in Noah's words, a "category growth"), because by association and necessity, they will end up using Google's services, I recognized this kind of approach in systems thinking and "design thinking".
And this is where the question becomes how is this new. People in marketing figured out about "compliments" (as Carr puts it) way before Google showed up. Smart marketers know that they need to put a product/service in the wider context of people's lives. The job is to figure out connections = what fits well with other stuff? So in simple terms, it means educating and motivating people about running if you are selling running shoes; teaching people to cook if you are selling kitchenware; inspiring and tutoring women if you are selling makeup; you help people live healthier if you sell vitamins. In all these instances, product is pushed vicariously, through trying to transform people's behavior. Nothing new there. Marketers were trying to expand market for whatever they are selling for decades now.
So, now back to Google. The real question is whether "expanding the category" is a long-term business growth strategy for Google? Or, does Google need a second act? For a while now, as Brian put it, Google's been throwing billions and billions since "it hit on a tremendous product (search) at a time when the Internet was exploding. It lucked out that Bill Gross pioneered a readymade business model for it. It just needed to tweak it." The question is now, can it continue its growth/domination just on making more people use the Internet more?
While I think that's a completely legit business path to take, Google's been lauded as a revolutionary (most famously in Jarvis' book that's fervor more than few people found uncomfortable). What Google does right now is - it turns out - far from revolutionary. Is it smart? Definitely. Does it help Google make money? For sure. But to be a real innovator in your market, you got to come up with something, well, new.