Google’s Traffic Acquisition Costs
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Usually people pay Google to up their search ranking to acquire traffic to their sites. But this article is about Google paying others, particularly the device makers, money to make Google the “default” search engine. The amount breached $26 Billion in 2021 paid by Google to various device makers.
This information came out because of antitrust lawsuit filed by the Justice Department against Google.
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Yes. I've read that Apple derives a significant amount of $$$ by making Google the default search.
DuckDuckGo has approached them, but to no avail - yet.
There are also rumors that Apple wants to make the search engine in-house.
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Yes. I've read that Apple derives a significant amount of $$$ by making Google the default search.
DuckDuckGo has approached them, but to no avail - yet.
There are also rumors that Apple wants to make the search engine in-house.
@George-K said in Google’s Traffic Acquisition Costs:
Yes. I've read that Apple derives a significant amount of $$$ by making Google the default search.
DuckDuckGo has approached them, but to no avail - yet.
There are also rumors that Apple wants to make the search engine in-house.
I did not realize that the $$$ were so high. Most people are pretty lazy, and even though it is quite easy to change away from Google, probably 90+% do not.
I did not know about Apple developing their search engine, but it does kind of follow the Apply strategy of keeping most things inside.
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@George-K said in Google’s Traffic Acquisition Costs:
Yes. I've read that Apple derives a significant amount of $$$ by making Google the default search.
DuckDuckGo has approached them, but to no avail - yet.
There are also rumors that Apple wants to make the search engine in-house.
I did not realize that the $$$ were so high. Most people are pretty lazy, and even though it is quite easy to change away from Google, probably 90+% do not.
I did not know about Apple developing their search engine, but it does kind of follow the Apply strategy of keeping most things inside.
@taiwan_girl said in Google’s Traffic Acquisition Costs:
I did not realize that the $$$ were so high. Most people are pretty lazy, and even though it is quite easy to change away from Google, probably 90+% do not.
https://9to5mac.com/2023/10/20/apple-search-payment-case/
When you do a search in the combined URL/search bar on any Apple device, the default search engine will be used. Unless you have manually changed it, that search engine is Google.
The traffic from searches on iPhones, iPads, and Macs is worth a huge sum of money to Google, as that’s what allows it to display relevant ads alongside search results. To keep that traffic and money flowing, Google pays Apple an undisclosed sum each year for maintaining its default search engine status.
The most recent payment has been estimated at around $20B – which would make up around 15% of Apple’s total profits.
I did not know about Apple developing their search engine, but it does kind of follow the Apply strategy of keeping most things inside.
For years, Apple Inc. pondered building a search engine that could replace Google as the preferred option on its devices.
The argument: Search is one of the most used tools on smartphones, tablets and computers — and Apple’s modus operandi has long been to own the core technologies underlying its products. There are also billions of dollars at stake. Right now, Apple gets a cut of Google’s search ad revenue, a commission that has brought in roughly $8 billion annually in recent years. But imagine if Apple could keep more of that money.
If the company successfully deployed its own search engine, it could potentially create a revenue stream about the size of the Apple Watch, assuming it can sell advertising and search slots at the same price as Google. The probability of that happening is a long shot, but — even if Apple can’t quite match Google — the company could probably create more revenue by bringing search in-house.
Apple knows this. That’s one reason why it’s been tinkering with search technology for years. The work has its benefits, even if the company doesn’t launch a Google rival: Apple can improve its non-web search capabilities, and it could serve as a frightening bargaining chip in pricing negotiations with Google.
Google may be dominant in search, but the company still needs Apple and its billions of users. As long as their agreement is in place, Apple has an incentive to steer its customers toward Google. The more Apple promotes Google search, the more money Apple makes.
As a person involved in the deal has told me, aligning the incentives of Apple and Google was a big part of the agreement. Apple could send all its customers to the DuckDuckGo search engine if it wanted to, but that would just hurt Apple.
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https://www.pcmag.com/news/google-pays-apple-36-of-its-safari-browser-search-ad-revenue
It has been revealed that Google pays Apple 36% of the revenue it generates from search advertising through the Safari browser.
As Bloomberg reports, the revelation came from Google's own economics expert, University of Chicago professor Kevin Murphy, during his testimony at the Justice Department’s antitrust trial. Google's main litigator, John Schmidtlein, "visibly cringed" when Murphy revealed the percentage.
This substantial percentage of revenue confirms the high price parent company Alphabet is willing to pay to ensure the Safari browser ships with Google as the default search engine. The antritrust proceedings already revealed that the company pays $18 billion a year to be the default search engine on Apple's devices. Now we know Apple also gets a chunk of the ad revenue from this browser deal.
