Hence this is $330mn of PURE Gross Profit! Google typically spends 30% of its revenues in R&D & G&A expenses. There is no direct cost (of revenue/goods sold) for this ad inventory – unlike the ad inventory from the content network where about 75% of the revenues are paid out to the content network partner. $ 330mn in increased revenues – simply by removing the ‘I’m feeling lucky’ button! $11bn in annual revenues x a conservative 3% = Hence the ‘I’m feeling Lucky’ guys could account for (almost) 3% of ‘opportunity’ revenues Those well crafted & well placed ads (like ours!) would attract their attention a lot more.Ĭ) If the average Bing user is twice as likely as the average Google user to click on an ad, I’d argue that the average ‘I’m feeling lucky’ clicker, had he clicked on the money making ‘Google Search’ button instead, would be at least thrice as likely to click on an ad. In fact, I suspect that this number would be higher considering the increasing number of newbie net users especially in developing countries! You’d expect the people who click on “I’m Feling Lucky” to be net newbies and unable to really differentiate between organic and paid results. In effect, I’m assuming that search from Google homepage(s) contributes to $11bn of the total $22bn revenue.ī) Lets assume that the ‘1% of people click on I’m Feeling Lucky’ still holds. I’m simply assuming that (and other country sites) account for about 50%, and properties like Gmail and other Google sites account for the balance 16%. 66% of Google’s revenues are from Google owned sites. So Google left $110 million on the table two years ago! Let’s try and recalculate the figure now…Ī) Google’s annual revenue in 2008 was $22 billion – about twice its revenues in 2006. I think what’s delightful about ‘I’m Feeling Lucky’ is that it reminds you there are real people here,” Google exec Marissa Mayer explained, or at least tried to. So why does Google keep such a costly button around? “It’s possible to become too dry, too corporate, too much about making money. That costs the company around $110 million in annual revenue, according to Rapt’s Tom Chavez. Because the button takes users directly to the top search result, Google doesn’t get to show search ads on one percent of all its searches.

Google cofounder Sergey Brin told public radio’s Marketplace that around one percent of all Google searches go through the “I’m Feeling Lucky” button. So, I googled it up (note the subtle irony here) and came across a very interesting article from Nov 2007 here’s an excerpt: Who clicks the ‘I’m feeling Lucky’ button anyway? C) I clicked on the ‘I’m feeling lucky’ button on Google today – more out of curiosity than out of habit! This got me thinking…

I am feeling lucky button