Why is Google’s homepage blank? Company can earn Rs 5000 crore daily by showing ads! But why not earn?

Until AI tools like ChatGPT came into existence, if there was anything that humans used the most on the Internet, it was Google’s search engine. It has become a habit for many people to first search Google and then open the Google homepage. As soon as you open the homepage, the first thing you see is a clean and empty Google homepage. A colorful logo in the middle and a small search box below. Nothing else, no ads. Why has Google left the page blank which is visited by billions of people around the world every day? Behind this ’empty space’ lies a game worth billions of dollars.

The beginning is very interesting. In 1998, two Stanford University students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, were creating a search engine named Google. At that time, the reason for keeping the homepage blank was not a well-thought-out strategy but a compulsion. In fact, both of them did not know HTML coding properly at that time. He just created a simple search box and started working. But when he saw that people were liking this clean design, this compulsion gradually became the world’s biggest business strategy.

At that time, Google chose a path completely opposite to that of giants like Yahoo! and MSN. While other portals crowded their homepage with news, shopping and advertisements, Google made speed its identity. Even today the size of Google’s homepage is only around 14 KB, which opens in less than a second in the blink of an eye. At the same time, Yahoo’s page was 200 to 500 KB in size, which took 3-8 seconds to open. In those times when the internet was very slow, this speed of Google was very important and people liked it. Even today in the era of 5G, this speed remains a ‘silent brand promise’ of Google. (Image – Canva)

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Internet users were tired of seeing pages full of advertisements. Pop-ups, banners, flash ads were spoiling the user experience. Whatever Google did then, it became an instant hit. Its clean and clear pages helped Google send a very clear message that “We are a search engine, not an entertainment portal.” Instead of selling, Google focused on helping people. When users saw that this company did not bother them with unnecessary pop-ups or advertisements, their trust in Google increased. Because of this trust, today ‘Googling’ has become an idiom. This user loyalty proved to be more valuable than any advertisement. You will be surprised to know that now Yahoo has also adopted the policy of no ads on Google’s homepage. Its search homepage also now comes without any advertisements. (Image – Canva)

One masterstroke of Google was that Google understood that the real money is not in the homepage, but in the search results. Not every person who visits the homepage comes to buy something, but the person who is searching ‘best smartphone under 20000’ is a potential buyer. Advertisers are ready to pay a lot of money to such a person to showcase their product. Google increased its brand value by keeping its homepage clean and started earning billions from targeted advertisements through search results. (Image – Canva)

If we look at the calculations of how much Google could have earned from its homepage, the figures are mind-blowing. There are approximately 850 crore visits on Google every day. If Google had placed banner advertisements there, it could have earned around Rs 5,000 crore to Rs 15,000 crore in a day. On an annual basis, this earning could have ranged from approximately Rs 20 lakh crore to Rs 50 lakh crore. But the reality is that if there were advertisements, perhaps so many people would not have come to Google! (Image – Canva)

This model of Google works like a ‘Trojan Horse’. You come to Google after seeing the simplicity, your trust is built, and when you search what you need, then Google understands your behavior and shows you the right advertisement. For this reason, Google’s actual revenue in 2024 will be around Rs 19.67 lakh crore. (Image – Canva)