Google Old School.

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Is it ironic that on the day that Google reports disappointing earnings in The New York Times, it runs its first ever double-truck 4-color spread in said Times?  Google and its ad agency BBH are dialing up old school advertising in this new media world. Their Chrome TV ad with the father and newly minted collegiate daughter videoconferencing back and forth over the web is brilliant. (The wrinkle that the mom has just passed away (we think) adding a little Sons of Anarchy reality to the story certainly shows an evolution of the medium. Remember the “Sophie” spot?)

Now I don’t want to go all old school here but Joseph Jaffe and all those pop marketing people who cashed in on the “TV spot being dead, long live the social web” can now write new chapters. When Stub Hub, I mean Hub Spot, came down off its “inbound marketing” high horse a number of months ago and started sending out more emails than a belly flattening supplement, I knew the madness had stopped. Ish.

Google is still amazing. A brand that has lost some of its Is-Does way, it is still is playing in important, meaningful worlds.  

I once railed about “Google’s culture of technological obesity,” but have to admit there is a marketing hand at the wheel. Chromebook, Motorola, mapping services, Google+ Hangouts and AdSense make for strange bedfellows yet good marketing oversight fueled by tough decision-making will prevail.  And the freshest fish in the city for all NY employees doesn’t hurt either. Peace!