Overnight, the two continuously communicated via phone, revising the keyword advertising plan. It wasn't about pursuing perfection, but about ensuring logical consistency.
More importantly, it was to help her deeply understand the superiority of this plan, so she wouldn't be without her own ideas when facing doubts.
The fact that the keyword advertising patent was applied for by someone else first truly panicked He Zhengcheng. So much so that he had to solve the problem by staying up all night, though it might actually be of no use.
No one is born a protagonist. Perhaps Google, after its IPO, or rather, Google after developing and promoting the Android System, is the true protagonist.
But Google, still in its infancy, was not a good investment project; too many accidents could lead to its demise. However, if one didn't invest now, besides one instance where Silicon Valley venture capital giants Sequoia Capital and KPCB jointly invested in Google, the only other chance would be to participate in Google's IPO in 2004.
If memory serves, Google's market value at the time of its IPO was around 20 billion USD, and many years later, it reached a market value of one trillion USD. No matter how you look at it, a 50-fold return in less than 20 years is a very successful investment.
However, He Zhengcheng's panic wasn't entirely about money; his investment in Google was only 3 million USD. What he cared about was the unpredictable future. If Google ran into problems, would his memories still be useful? Would he still be able to take advantage of others?
After accompanying Lin Zhiling to work on a PPT all night, he finally received an email at daybreak, around seven or eight o'clock.
He Zhengcheng checked it one last time, confirmed there were no issues, made some minor revisions, sent it to Page and Brin, and then rushed to Google.
"Christopher, what's going on with that email of yours?" Page asked urgently when he saw He Zhengcheng arrive.
"Just let me calm down first!" He Zhengcheng said, and then the three of them went to an office.
"I received news yesterday that startled me. Shanhai Capital, while looking for investment targets, discovered a search company that already had a mature business model, and this model was somewhat similar to what a friend of mine had told me about before.
After hearing the report, I looked it up online. This business model, combined with what my friend said, indeed has the potential to become our primary profit model. I didn't dare to delay and rushed this plan out with my friend overnight.
My only concern now is whether this search company, which is GoTo, has applied for a patent. If they have, can we circumvent it? If not, can we apply for it first?" He Zhengcheng spoke for several minutes, finally clarifying the issue.
"Your plan is to display ads on the right side of the search results. We will use two models to charge for advertising: one is cost per thousand impressions, and the other is pay-per-click. The core of this is keywords!" Page said.
"Exactly. I've heard you say that search engines can currently only recognize words and phrases and cannot yet understand a slightly longer sentence in a short amount of time.
So, every time a user searches, it's actually through individual keywords. Then, conversely, can't we sell some of these valuable keywords to customers who need them?" Regarding the patent issue, he currently had no good solution and could only rely on speed of development to defeat competitors, and then use capital to crush enemies. If all else failed, he would just consider this investment a failure.
"Advertising, right-side advertising." Brin hesitated.
"Do we really have to add advertisements?" Page wanted to object.
"What's there to hesitate about? How long can a non-profitable company last? Only profitable enterprises can survive long-term and provide our services to more users.
Only by making money can we try some outlandish ideas. For example, can we start our own rocket launch company and strive to freely travel in space one day? Can we immigrate to Mars?" He Zhengcheng was anxious, and his words were a bit incoherent.
"I'm not refusing advertising; I'm just concerned that the appearance of ads will affect user experience. There are so many search engine companies now, and competition is fierce. If we can't defeat our competitors, finding a profit model will be useless." Brin was not a moral paragon; if he were, the two of them wouldn't have chosen to start a business. Since they started a business, it meant they wanted to make money.
Therefore, He Mou couldn't understand why later on, many Chinese people lauded the high moral character of these two. In reality, it was just their different choices under different market environments. Li Yanhong, if he started a business in the United States, would also not lose his "conscience" for the sake of earning money from fake medical advertisements.
The Google Duo's concerns were not unfounded. Silicon Valley currently had at least a dozen recognizable search engine companies, and there were probably more unnamed ones. Of course, in everyone's impression, websites like Google and Baidu, which provide a simple search box and directly offer search services to netizens, were truly not many.
"Advertising doesn't have to be launched immediately, but the patent technology must be held in our own hands. And we can do A/B testing by region to observe the effect of advertising and its impact on user experience. We also need to design a keyword advertising system that allows customers to freely choose their Delivery area as needed." After talking for a while, He Zhengcheng also calmed down a lot and proposed a standard internet company operation: A/B testing.
"I think it's worth trying. This is currently the most suitable profit model I've seen for Google." Page looked at the PPT in the email. Zhi Ling had drawn a search result display diagram, with search results on the left and center of the webpage, and associated display ads on the right.
"I'm not saying this model won't work..." Sergey Brin hesitated, not finishing his sentence.
"By the way, where is your friend? Why didn't she come?" Page changed the subject.
"She's still sleeping in Toronto!" He Zhengcheng replied.
"She! You said she?" Page asked.
"That's right, the same friend who drew our logo last time." He Zhengcheng confirmed.
"What's your relationship with her?" Brin inquired.
"It's what you're thinking. I'm pursuing her, and I guess I've succeeded, but she's currently pursuing further studies in Toronto." He Zhengcheng explained.
"Is she interested in joining Google?" Page asked.
"I've tried to persuade her several times, but she hasn't given me a definite answer." He Zhengcheng replied.
"You should try to persuade her again. I think she's a great fit for us. Keyword advertising, that idea is simply brilliant!" Brin exclaimed.
"And the logo she designed is really good. Such a multi-talented person is exactly the kind of talent we urgently need here." Page added.
"I'll try again, after all, this concerns my life and needs." He Zhengcheng said.
"Hehehe..." The men chuckled strangely.
Sergey Brin had broken up with his ex-girlfriend and was pursuing Anne Wojcicki, the sister of Google employee Susan Wojcicki. These two sisters were also not simple; their family had a deep academic background, being the daughters of Stanford University physicist Stanley Wojcicki and Esther Wojcicki, Vice President of the non-profit organization "Creative Commons."
To put it plainly, the Google Duo's social connections in the United States were much better than He Mou's.
There was no use rushing the development of Google's keyword advertising; He Zhengcheng, who didn't understand technology, could only watch. Moreover, Google still had many important things to do, such as finding ways to reduce the ever-increasing server costs.
At this time, many internet companies, after purchasing servers, installed them in large storage centers owned by third parties. These storage space providers paid for electricity to ensure server operation and purchased air conditioning to cool the servers, while website owners paid fees based on space.
Conventional servers required a lot of space but were not very efficient. Larry Page was trying to reduce the size of servers, for example, by assembling them himself, customizing components, and removing unnecessary server switches... These efforts were effective, even if they couldn't reduce the purchase cost of servers, they did reduce maintenance costs. According to later statistics, Google's cost to operate a single server was only one-thirtieth of that of an early competitor, Inktomi.