Verbifying Google

Not many brands can say they are actually a verb. What do you say when someone asks you how you researched something? I bet you say "I googled it." Did you just nod your head? I thought so.

Google has been verbified. It's so deeply ingrained in our culture to the point where it's now actually part of our dictionary. Why did we do this? What has Google done that makes it so special that it can stand along side other brands such as Photoshop, Rollerblades, and Facebook who have also become verbs?

Consider this video:

Cute right? Get's me every single time. Tears in my eyes, goosebumps on my arms. Even now as I re-watch the video to refresh my memory, I start to bawl like a little child.

Google's strategy is phenomenal - provide a service that has multiple extensions that are all extremely useful and if they were taken away the next day, the general populace would probably lose their mind. To top it off, create commercials that showcase the use of the internet not by explaining how the products work but by showing a real life human being (a dad in this case) using all the products Google has to offer to write to his daughter and catalog his memories of her. Scrap booking? Why do that when you can do it ten times better by utilizing the internet to make it happen.

The web truly is what you make of it.

Google does a great job of striking the emotional cord in the consumer. They released similar videos called "Coffee" and "Jess Time" that have a very similar affect on my emotions. They have humanized the brand and for that brief moment, I think to myself, "Yes! I'm going to do this very same thing when I have my own kid one day!" And to be honest, I probably will, thanks to Google. What parent wouldn't want to?

Google may have lost the tech junkies on this one with not enough tech jargon. It doesn't go into the true power of Google and the algorithms that have made it what it is today. But then again it didn't really need to, now did it? The products that Google has created can stand on their own virtual legs.

Besides, we know that the techies are going to still use Google and probably use some forum instead to find out info on all the latest and greatest. They wont need a commercial to tell them. They'll just go google it.

-D