Google Mobile Searches Move Ahead of Desktop

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Published
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Google AdWords management has reported that mobile searches in many of the world’s large markets have surpassed those from desktops. The ubiquity of smartphones and tablets has made that change likely for some time. For Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL), the trend may not be bothersome at all. It is proof that people who use search engines will use Google wherever and however they visit the Internet. It is bad news for Google’s competitors, which hoped the consumer migration to mobile would give them a chance to improve their market shares on portable devices, from their pitiful share on traditional computers.

In a post titled “Building for the Next Moment,” Jerry Dischler, the Vice President of Product Management for AdWords, wrote:

Billions of times per day, consumers turn to Google for I want-to-know, I want-to-go, I want-to-do, and I want-to-buy moments. And at these times, consumers are increasingly picking up their smartphones for answers. In fact, more Google searches take place on mobile devices than on computers in 10 countries including the US and Japan. This presents a tremendous opportunity for marketers to reach people throughout all the new touchpoints of a consumer’s path to purchase.

The observation was based on internal Google data, which means it is accurate.

Google does face trouble as the use of its search engine moves to portable devices. CPMs, the yield that marketers pay for their ads, are often not as good as on mobile as on personal computers. So, Google’s yield on these ads may be lower than its traditional revenue.

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Management indicated that mobile use has soared based on its most recent financials:

“Google’s first quarter revenue was $17.3 billion, up 12% year on year. Excluding the net impact of foreign currency headwinds, revenue grew a healthy 17% year on year,” said Patrick Pichette, CFO of Google. “We continue to see great momentum in our mobile advertising business and opportunities with brand advertisers.”

Presumably the report confirms the speed of the migration away from personal computers.

As Google’s dominance moves to portable devices, it will hold its lead as the preferred search engine. However, from a revenue point to view, the trend is a mixed blessing.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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