Chrome, which was launched just over a year ago, certainly does not compete in terms of popularity with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and Mozilla’s Firefox, both of which have been around a lot longer.

It looks as though Google has decided to take up the challenge to change the situation, and has started actively promoting the browser through some rather unexpected channels in the UK.

Just yesterday, the Metro newspaper, which is distributed for free on the London Underground was “wrapped” in a cover that advertised Chrome.

On the front page of the wrapper, Chrome was described as “A fast new browser. Made for everyone”. On the inside of the cover details about the browser’s unique features, such as its stability and the incognito tab handling methods, were mentioned. On the rear page of the wrapper were ‘notes’ made by a supposed user of Chrome, followed by the line “6 tabs. 0 crashes. 1 browser”.

The Metro is distributed free on all weekdays and readers generally read it during their morning commute. It has a circulation of 1.3 million of which 738,000 users are based in London.

Twitter users have also reported spotting billboards advertising Chrome in London and Manchester. In fact, one such hoarding was placed right across the front gate of the head quarters of Google’s recent critic, Rupert Murdoch’s company, News International.

Magazines, television and blogs are also propagating another Google campaign, promoting Chrome as a free Christmas gift accompanied by a slick flash micro-site that “wraps” the Chrome logo and sends it as a gift with a personalised message to anyone a user wishes to forward it to.

These advertising strategies point to the fact that Google is either trying to advertise Chrome to people who are not yet hooked on the Internet, or they’re running out of ideas to boost Chrome’s popularity.

A number of marketing specialists have criticised the campaign, saying that Google should know better than to target advertising for a product in a medium where prospective adopters cannot convert into users easily. In other words, people reading a newspaper or seeing a billboard will not be likely to go online and download the Chrome browser. However, what the ads will do, is build brand presence in consumers’ minds, which might then help Google when they launch the Chrome operating system.

The publication of an application for a patent from Google for ‘Ringback Advertising’ is an indication of this intention.

What ‘Ringback Advertising’ actually refers to technology that allows Google to detect when a person dials a number, and determine whether to play an audio ad before the recipient answers the phone.

In its original form, Ringback Tone Advertising (also known as Ringback Advertising and Ad Ring Back Tones) is a new feature available from a number of mobile phone services where the ringtone normally heard by a caller is replaced with an audio advertising message.  The advertisement playback stops when the call is answered.

Google’s Ringback Advertising system would be able to detect call origination from a number and determine which ad to play, based on categories associated with the audio ad and the caller.

Ads placed via the new system could be inserted when a call is on hold, during call waiting, and even when the caller is still dialing his number.

The patent that has been published online, gives an indication of the features which would be incorporated in the service, when it is started. They are:

• Ringback Advertising will be similar to online Google ads, in that they will be auction based
• At the time of auction, advertisers will be able to state their preferred caller location, and their products will be sorted by category
• Caller location will be considered when deciding which ads to relay
• Callers will also be able to choose the category of ads they would be interested in
• Advertisers will not be charged a fixed amount every time their ad is played, but will be charged according to the length of time for which the user listens to the ad
• For optimization of the service, metrics such as ‘Listen through ratio’ will be made available
• Third party publishers, who wish to play Google’s audio ads through their own audio system, will be able to do so, at a price of course!

At present these features are only tentative, and only once Google finalises how and when to implement this service will the final details be made available.

Ericsson’s Innovation

Ericsson already offers multimedia ringback and ringback advertising options to operators.  Research from the mobile manufacturer has also found that consumers rate Ringback Advertising as the 2nd most acceptable form of mobile advertising.

Google’s patent does not specify whether the system will be limited to mobiles or will also cover landlines. If the patent were to be granted, the system would likely need to be platform / media independant.

Could this mean that Google Ringback Advertising will take Ericsson’s innovation a step further by introducing it on landlines as well as mobiles?

Interesting new features of the audio ads program include:

• Budgeting on a weekly rather than daily basis
• Demographic targeting of ads
• Ad targetting by radio station
• Geographical targeting by city, state, post (zip) code or countrywide
• Pricing based on CPM – cost per thousand listeners
• Google estimates audience numbers based on Arbitron’s estimates
• Ad scheduling enabled for days of the week and times of the day, similar to CPC ads.

The full post can be viewed at http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2007/03/first-look-at-google-audio-radio-ads.html