Disrupting Google Search

In 2020, nearly 2/3rds of queries on Google ended on Google itself i.e., without clicking on an external link (organic or ad). This highlights how over time Google is increasingly showing the results for common queries inline (in its knowledge graph) rather than directing traffic to websites.

In general, query growth is relatively slow (Google already does >100B queries per month), but Google continues to show ads on more queries and optimize the click through rate and cost per click which continues to drive 30%+ revenue growth.

Today, Google largely indexes the public web. But often when searching for items, the best results might be contained in internal work documents or in email.

Google Search today is doing ~$150B run-rate in revenue.

On mobile, Google still has to pony up $5-10B per year (and rising) to remain the default search engine on iOS.

The key drivers of the business are: number of ad impressions/clicks and the effective price per impression/click.

Per Wedbush, as of today, 80% of queries are still not monetized by ads (given not being of a commercial nature), so there continues to be a lot of room for Google to show more ads.

One is as above to pick a vertical, and offer a curated approach for that vertical. One example of this is WireCutter or even The Infatuation, which although are content sites, become the place many users start their “search” for products and restaurants rather than Google.

On a daily basis, 15 percent of queries submitted have never been seen before by Google's search engine. This highlights just how long the tail is of search (and also just how differently people phrase perhaps similar questions).