How to spell D-o-o-d-l-e? Sizeable free SEA for FIFA & Co.

Most of you have certainly noticed that Google changes its logo on google.com from time to time to commemorate events, birthdays and current political affairs. We love this kind of stuff at Analyx, so we took a closer look...

33 Doodles per Month on average

Google users have been able to marvel at 4,782 doodles since 2009, some of them animated, others not. This includes global and regional ones -- Doodles are localized so people in India wouldn't necessarily see a celebration of Groundhog Day in the year 2000 ??

Doodle me, pleeeeaaaase...

The criteria Google uses to select its doodles is a well-kept secret. First used in 1998 as a note of absence, the drawings have appeared regularly since 2000. In 2011, the company even applied for a US patent. According to the company website, a team of ten people takes care of the selection and graphic processing, and today creates up to 400 doodles per year. A children's drawing competition regularly awards prizes for suggestions that are subsequently animated for the website.

Holidays, Birthdays, Elections - and: Sports

Of the 4,782 Doodles mentioned above, 2,175 were for festivals and holidays. In second place, users see Doodles for honorary days of important personalities (1,575). Other occasions also receive special editions of the logo: For example, an election day was commemorated 184 times with a Doodle in the period under review. Major sporting events are in fourth place, after political elections, with 167 doodles. Small drawings related to vaccination campaigns appeared a total of 34 times - exclusively in 2021 and 2022.???

Football's coming home(page)

When it comes to major sporting events, football (=soccer) dominates. The men's World Cup accounts for the most Doodles. The first one appeared for the final in 2010. Since 2014, at least one Doodle has been regularly shown per match day for the men. The Women's World Cup did not receive this level of global, daily attention until five years later. Although there was a Doodle for the kick-off of the World Cup in 2011 and three graphics for the kick-off, the final and the winning team in 2015 - Doodles for every match day of the tournament can only be found for the kicking women since 2019.

Can you click it? Yes you can!

Six out of 10 people I randomly interviewed for this post had no idea that a Doodle is clickable. But it is. A click on the title Doodle of this post would give you a curated list of links to relevant websites. Usually, Wikipedia leads the pack but there are also a number of more or less commercial websites related to the topic, especially when it comes to major sports events. Sure, there is no Ticketmaster but fifa.com will show you the way...

Free SEA anyone?

By now some #WednesdayWhizz readers might have asked themselves why this is relevant for media and marketing effectiveness? Well, I try to close the loop for those of you patient enough to read up to this point ??:

There has been some debate among Marketers recently on the role of SEA as an advertising channel as opposed to a signpost to your offerings - and how to budget it. See here for some great reading on the subject:

As the cute graphics are linked to a list of links corresponding to the topic and Google is deciding on the Doodle content, this makes for a pretty big signpost - especially for global Doodles. Consider this:

• 3.5 billion search queries are recorded by Google worldwide every day;
• Let's assume that the price for an impression, i.e. a paid link for a brand search, is 15 Euro cents;
• If 0.1 percent of users click on the Doodle and then see the link to FIFA, for example, this would correspond to a free ad value of 525,000 EUR - and that's on every match day with a Doodle.

Now the remaining question is: How on earth do I get my brand associated to Groundhog Day? ??