Google Glass: Development, Marketing and User Acceptance

GOOGLE GLASS: DEVELOPMENT, MARKETING AND USER ACCEPTANCE

Jorge Justiniano

Fisher College

Section I Introduction

Google Glass: Development, Marketing and User Acceptance” written by Thompson Sh. Teo is about the Google glasses development and marketing. The case focuses on how this new technology was developed, describe the different problem that Google had regarding the promotion of the product, and illustrate the tension that the company has while they were developing this new technology.

Google thought that they were reinventing the wheel when they were developing the Google Glass. They thought that this new product could change the world. A pair of glasses that allows you to project anything, from pictures to phone call would have an unlimited number of customers. Apparently, Google did not take all the factors into consideration when they were launching this new product to the public and indeed failed to promote it. Google could not handle the controversy around this new product properly and ended losing millions of dollars and killing a great product.

Section II Situation

The key issue that Google had regarding the Goggle Glasses was not its technology but the lack of understanding of its market (Marks, 2014). Google could not create a consistent marketing strategy and so when they decided to launched the product to the retail market it ended being one of the biggest failures that Google ever had to face (Marks, 2014). Google is a company that focuses all its efforts to create technology, and they are one of the best, but when they have to sell it to the public, they are not certainly the best. All of this is translated into the lack of experience and capability to positioning a product in the current market. The segmentation of the market was one of the biggest issues that Google had (Marks, 2014). When they were testing the product, they didn’t use the right group people. Google Glasses were tested by influencers and individuals that understand how technological products work who do not represent the target market that Google had in mind. The Google Glass target supposed to be common people, those were the one that had to test the product. If you do not receive feedback from your target market about how good or how bad your product is, you can be misled and consequently you will take a wrong decision. Also, people thought that in some ways the Google glasses were violating its privacy, so they started to boycott them (Marks, 2014). Google was incapable of take this idea from the public mind. It seems that Google was very confident about Google glass future and did not mind about the negative advertising that this product was creating.

Section III - Alternatives

One alternative that Google has is to re-launch the Google glasses to the retail market. The first attempt that Google had failed because Google did not target a particular market segment did not understand the consumer behavior properly, and Google could not position the product (Finney, 2014). As a consequence of this wrong decision, the Google glasses faced a backlash, because in the eye of the public the Google glasses were violating their privacy rights (Finney, 2014). To reintroduce the Google glasses to the retail market is crucial to overcoming this issues. Google has to convince the public that the Google glasses are safe to use and will not violate privacy rights.  Google has to be aware that the negative brand image of the Google glasses represents a high barrier and one way to overcome this barrier is by changing the name of the product (Finney, 2014). Also, a better understanding of the market will result in a better understanding of the consumer behavior, and the only way to accomplish that is through a proper market research.