Report: Google to debut ‘Home Mini’ smart speaker for $49 on October 4

The device is Google's answer to the low-cost Amazon Echo Dot.

Google is set to reveal the Pixel 2 smartphone and potentially other hardware at an event on October 4, in time for holiday shopping. While the Pixel 2 is set to be the star of the event, a prominent supporting role will be played by the new “Google Home Mini.”

This is apparently Google’s answer to the low-cost Amazon Echo Dot. According to Droid Life, it will be priced comparably at $49 and be available in three colors.

The device will support the Google Assistant and reportedly will provide the same functionality as Google Home. It’s all but certain the sound quality won’t be as good. And there may be other hardware compromises to bring costs down. It will very likely broaden the market for Google Home and the Google Assistant.

Amazon has created multiple Alexa devices for different budgets:

• Dot — $49
• Echo Tap — $129
• Echo — $179
• Echo Show — $229

Amazon often discounts the devices and offers multiple purchase incentives, including on the Dot. To date, Google has only introduced the Home, which retails for $129 but is often discounted to $99. Apple’s Siri-powered HomePod is going to retail for $349 and is positioned as a higher-end smart speaker for the Sonos demographic.

According to one estimate, Amazon dominates the US smart speaker market today. It has also been projected that by the end of 2017, there will be 30 million of these devices in US households. Assistant-enabled smart speakers are the cornerstone for the smart home ecosystem, and we’re in the midst of a land-grab right now.

ComScore has projected that roughly 50 percent of US search queries will be voice-initiated by 2020. More smart speakers in more American homes will help accelerate that trend.

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Report: Google earns 78% of $36.7B US search ad revenues, soon to be 80%

Amazon and Yelp expected to see biggest search revenue growth rates in US.

Google’s domination of the US search ad market isn’t letting up. Thanks to mobile in particular, Google will take 77.8 percent of US search ad revenues this year. By next year, for every dollar spent on search advertising in the US, an even eight dimes will go to Google. The remaining 20 cents will be split up among Microsoft, Yahoo, Yelp, Amazon, Ask and AOL, according to eMarketer’s latest report on the US digital ad market.

“Google’s dominance in search, especially mobile search, is largely coming from the growing tendency of consumers to turn to their smartphones to look up everything from the details of a product to directions,” said eMarketer forecasting analyst Monica Peart. “Google and mobile search as a whole will continue to benefit from this behavioral shift.”

Overall, search spending in the US is expected to increase 24 percent over the next three years, from $36.69 billion in 2017 to $45.63 billion in 2019.

Microsoft’s US search ad revenues are expected to grow from $2.79 billion this year to $3.02 billion in 2019, though its market share is expected to dip from 7.6 percent this year to 6.6 percent in 2019.

Yelp and Amazon are both expected to see the strongest growth rates in search ad revenues in the US over the coming years. Yelp’s local search app could crack $1 billion in search ad revenues in 2019, up from $730 million this year, though its market share is expected to slip from 6.9 percent to 5.8 percent in 2019. Product searches on Amazon could drive search advertising on the e-commerce channel up from $370 million this year to $600 million in 2019 and see modest market share gains from 1.9 percent last year to 2.2 percent in 2019. Aside from Google, Amazon was the only company that gained market share between 2016 and 2017.

Verizon’s AOL and IAC’s Ask will likely see search revenues stay flat, while Yahoo will rebound from 2016 with slim 1 to 2 percent growth through 2019.

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Amazon begins testing Product Listing Ads on AdWords

For the first time ever, Amazon Product Listing Ads have been popping up in what appears to be an AdWords test.

In 2012, Google’s Product Search was transformed from an organic product search tool into a pay-to-play shopping destination. Since the removal of Product Search, Amazon has not participated with Google’s Product Listing Ads. Until now. Merkle discovered Amazon testing PLAs in the wild — something completely new for the world’s largest online retailer.

According to Merkle’s Mark Ballard, Amazon appears to be testing (and increasing) its PLA presence. We were able to replicate these Amazon Product Listing Ads on both mobile and desktop environments. Mr. Ballard’s anecdotal research is showing that Amazon is currently more apt to appear for home goods retailers, and they are trending up to a 25 percent impression share.

If this does become more than just a test, it could be a huge hit to other (and smaller) retailers that can’t compete with the budget of this shopping behemoth. Advertisers can compare their efforts to what Amazon is doing by researching with the Auction Insights tool.

Head on over to Merkle to read the full story and see all of the PLA data

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Move over Amazon Echo & Google Home: here comes Microsoft Cortana

Can’t decide which voice-activated home assistant you want, Amazon Echoor Google Home? Next year, you’ll have a third choice — Microsoft’s Cortana.

Unlike Amazon and Google, Microsoft isn’t making it a Cortana device itself. Rather, today it announced a way for anyone to integrate its Cortana agent into devices, through the Cortana Devices SDK.

That’s apparently going to be used by Harman Kardon to make a speaker with Cortana smarts to be released next year. Microsoft shared the news in a blog post today, along with a short teaser video:

No pricing, exact release date or even a name has been announced. Presumably, other manufacturers could also come out with their own Cortana devices — and it’s a fair bet that Microsoft will likely make its own, too.

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