Google's Silent Monopoly

An anonymous reader writes "Isaac Garcia from Central Desktop Blog writes, 'How much does Google pay *itself* to claim the top ad position for searches relevant to its own products? Google holds the top advertisement (Adword) slot for the following key words: intranet, spreadsheet, documents, calendar, word processor, email, video, instant messenger, blog, photo sharing, online groups, maps, start page, restaurants, dining, and books... ...if you are trying to advertise a product that is competitive to Google, then you'll never be able to receive the Top Ad Position, no matter how much money you bid and spend. How different is it than MSFT placing its products (Internet Explorer) in a premium marketing position (embedded in the OS)?'"

Does this really derserve an answer?

[_iris]

Microsoft was not at fault for putting their browser in an exclusive position on Windows. They were at fault for using their OS monopoly to stunt competition in the browser market. Every large multi-market company uses their products to enhance their other products (e.g. Apple = iPod + OSX + iTunes). The difference is that Google does not have a monopoly on search or advertising.

Re:it's so different

[supremebob]

The results for "spreadsheet" are kinda fishy, though... Both the top three search links and the top sponsor links are for Google's spreadsheet product, and I don't see ANY links to Microsoft's Excel spreadsheet sites on the first page of results. Considering that Excel is the dominant spreadsheet product (for better or worse), doesn't it seem odd that it didn't it was excluded?

Re:it's so different

[Qzukk]

Considering that Excel is the dominant spreadsheet product

Maybe Microsoft felt that Excel had already reached the maximum mindshare and that advertising wouldn't do anything for them anymore. After all, if everyone thinks spreadsheet: Excel, then paying google to tell people spreadsheet: Excel doesn't help.

Re:it's so different

[Aladrin]

Maybe, just maybe, most of those have the top spot on Google because when people want google maps, they go to google.com and search for 'maps'. And groups. And spreadsheets. I do that quite a lot, rather than go to maps.google.com.

It's entirely possible that they aren't even affecting these searches AT ALL. That natural tendencies put them at the top.

BTW, restaurants and dining didn't produce any Google stuff at all, from what I could see.

Re:It's fine for Google to do that

[e4g4]

This seems a little too cut and dry. Without the users, Google would have no customers - it seems to me that we are customers of Google by proxy. In other words, we pay the advertisers (with eyeball/click through time) and the advertisers pay Google (with money). Remove any link in that chain and it all falls to pieces; therefore I'd say that we are indeed (though indirectly) Google's customers, as it is in Google's best interest to keep both us and the advertisers happy.

Re:Monopoly Behavior

[typobox43]

search.msn.com is giving me 806 results on a search for google [live.com] and over 65 million on a search for google -asdfghjkl [live.com].

It is like asking how much Safeway charges itself

[tim1602]

Nobody questions how much the grocery stores charge themselves to put their store brand products on their shelves. This is the exact same situation. If you own the store you don't have to let any product in that you don't want. It isn't so much a dollar amount as it is an opportunity cost. Would they make more by promoting their own product, or by advertising another one?
As for Google being a monopoly in search engine, do a search for "internet search engines". When I did it MSN came up number one after the paid results.
Simple, not really a concern in a free market environment. Now whether that exists or not is fodder for another discussion.