Narasimha Jayakumar, business head, Google India, talks to Sakshi Khattar on the emerging trends in the online space for the education sector.
Q) In what ways will innovation in technology have an impact on higher education?
Technology, today, plays a central role in providing access to information. It is breaking down barriers to make information more accessible even in remote locations. The ability to find and discover information from around the world at the click of a mouse has made each of us more informed and powerful as individuals. Research from IAMAI iCube report states that education-related searches are the fourth most popular activity online. This indicates that the internet has become central to education whether it is for finding the right institute for higher studies or just researching the internet for project works.
At Google, our goal is to give, all our users around the world, access to the information they want, from the widest variety of sources, wherever they are. Making the world’s information universally accessible and useful, exploring greater choices, new freedom and ultimately more power for people is our objective. Search is at the heart of what Google does.
As we see the broadband penetration increase in the country — videos will become an increasingly popular source of information for education. In fact, many universities already have channels on YouTube where they post videos by senior professors on various topics.
Q) What is the future of local search in India? What have you added to local search in terms of new innovations?
Google breaks down geographic and language barriers. We have made web search available in more than 110 languages — with more than 10 different languages in the Indian subcontinent and have more than 1,500 local-language versions of our various products. Apart from this, we have also created a translation service, which makes it possible to search, read and communicate in scores of languages.
But pushing the boundaries of the web isn’t simply a question of adding more content and languages to our services. It’s also about making it easier for people to access that information. The majority of India’s citizens do not own a computer. For many of these people, making it possible to conduct a search, find maps, or scan the news on mobile phones is much more than just useful and convenient; it’s a doorway to the whole world, to greater educational opportunities and fresh perspectives.
We recently launched various sets of applications like search by voice and by camera images called Google Goggles, as well as providing direction by using landmarks and local business listings on Google places. The newest innovation is the product search, which helps people see, compare and make an informed choice when shopping. With technologies such as voice and image recognition, location and language intelligence, users now enjoy a great degree of personalisation.
Another important area of work is building ‘accessible’ products — meaning products that work for those who have difficulty in viewing or typing. Our ‘Accessible Search,’ for example, is designed to help the visually impaired find the most relevant, useful and comprehensive information on the web, as quickly as possible. Our goal is to use the capabilities of technology to meet the rapidly growing and changing demands of people for more information.
Q) What are the recent online consumer and advertiser trends in the education sector?
The internet population in our country is predominantly young, with 18 to 35 forming the majority. This young audience is always looking at the internet for information across subjects. We have international universities, vocational training institutes to online education portals as our advertisers. Online medium gives them the flexibility to manage their cost, precisely target their audience and the ability to engage students in an interactive manner.
With over 70 million internet users in the country — the online advertising spent by the education sector has gone up significantly and advertisers are spending around 30% of the total advertisement budget online and this is expected to go up to 45% in the next two years. Education, in fact, is one of our fastest growing verticals in terms of ad spends and we expect this to continue. Advertisers are reaching out to students through search-related advertising on Google search and are also increasingly looking to building brand awareness by advertising on properties like Orkut and YouTube in India.
Q) Google has become an addiction for many. Do you feel it affects one’s creativity?
Easy access to information only makes people more informed and help make smarter decisions. Discovering information on the internet, in fact, aids creative thinking and opens up minds to explore more. We regularly receive comments from our users on how they find our services and products very useful when working on their projects.
Q) Do you have any projects with schools or colleges where you are reaching out to students directly?
We started a unique project in India called 'The Internet Bus of Google.' This was initiated as a mobile ‘internet laboratory’ that would travel to small towns across the country; educate people about the internet, show them what the internet could do for them, and stimulate demand. Our goal is to empower people with information. The idea was to get people to interact with the internet and use it to solve their day-to-day information needs. We also reached out to students and the common man on the street to educate them on how they can place information on the internet, add web content, and make the internet useful to others around them.
The previous leg (Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Kerala and Rajasthan) of the Internet Bus has enjoyed success and interest among the people of these states. At present, the Google Internet Bus is touring Punjab and Haryana. It is presently in Amritsar, which is its 86city and has touched the lives of more than 6,00,000 Indians across 500 locations. Surveys have indicated that 26% of these visitors have gone online for the first time after visiting the Internet Bus.
Q) In what ways will innovation in technology have an impact on higher education?
Technology, today, plays a central role in providing access to information. It is breaking down barriers to make information more accessible even in remote locations. The ability to find and discover information from around the world at the click of a mouse has made each of us more informed and powerful as individuals. Research from IAMAI iCube report states that education-related searches are the fourth most popular activity online. This indicates that the internet has become central to education whether it is for finding the right institute for higher studies or just researching the internet for project works.
At Google, our goal is to give, all our users around the world, access to the information they want, from the widest variety of sources, wherever they are. Making the world’s information universally accessible and useful, exploring greater choices, new freedom and ultimately more power for people is our objective. Search is at the heart of what Google does.
As we see the broadband penetration increase in the country — videos will become an increasingly popular source of information for education. In fact, many universities already have channels on YouTube where they post videos by senior professors on various topics.
Q) What is the future of local search in India? What have you added to local search in terms of new innovations?
Google breaks down geographic and language barriers. We have made web search available in more than 110 languages — with more than 10 different languages in the Indian subcontinent and have more than 1,500 local-language versions of our various products. Apart from this, we have also created a translation service, which makes it possible to search, read and communicate in scores of languages.
But pushing the boundaries of the web isn’t simply a question of adding more content and languages to our services. It’s also about making it easier for people to access that information. The majority of India’s citizens do not own a computer. For many of these people, making it possible to conduct a search, find maps, or scan the news on mobile phones is much more than just useful and convenient; it’s a doorway to the whole world, to greater educational opportunities and fresh perspectives.
We recently launched various sets of applications like search by voice and by camera images called Google Goggles, as well as providing direction by using landmarks and local business listings on Google places. The newest innovation is the product search, which helps people see, compare and make an informed choice when shopping. With technologies such as voice and image recognition, location and language intelligence, users now enjoy a great degree of personalisation.
Another important area of work is building ‘accessible’ products — meaning products that work for those who have difficulty in viewing or typing. Our ‘Accessible Search,’ for example, is designed to help the visually impaired find the most relevant, useful and comprehensive information on the web, as quickly as possible. Our goal is to use the capabilities of technology to meet the rapidly growing and changing demands of people for more information.
Q) What are the recent online consumer and advertiser trends in the education sector?
The internet population in our country is predominantly young, with 18 to 35 forming the majority. This young audience is always looking at the internet for information across subjects. We have international universities, vocational training institutes to online education portals as our advertisers. Online medium gives them the flexibility to manage their cost, precisely target their audience and the ability to engage students in an interactive manner.
With over 70 million internet users in the country — the online advertising spent by the education sector has gone up significantly and advertisers are spending around 30% of the total advertisement budget online and this is expected to go up to 45% in the next two years. Education, in fact, is one of our fastest growing verticals in terms of ad spends and we expect this to continue. Advertisers are reaching out to students through search-related advertising on Google search and are also increasingly looking to building brand awareness by advertising on properties like Orkut and YouTube in India.
Q) Google has become an addiction for many. Do you feel it affects one’s creativity?
Easy access to information only makes people more informed and help make smarter decisions. Discovering information on the internet, in fact, aids creative thinking and opens up minds to explore more. We regularly receive comments from our users on how they find our services and products very useful when working on their projects.
Q) Do you have any projects with schools or colleges where you are reaching out to students directly?
We started a unique project in India called 'The Internet Bus of Google.' This was initiated as a mobile ‘internet laboratory’ that would travel to small towns across the country; educate people about the internet, show them what the internet could do for them, and stimulate demand. Our goal is to empower people with information. The idea was to get people to interact with the internet and use it to solve their day-to-day information needs. We also reached out to students and the common man on the street to educate them on how they can place information on the internet, add web content, and make the internet useful to others around them.
The previous leg (Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Kerala and Rajasthan) of the Internet Bus has enjoyed success and interest among the people of these states. At present, the Google Internet Bus is touring Punjab and Haryana. It is presently in Amritsar, which is its 86city and has touched the lives of more than 6,00,000 Indians across 500 locations. Surveys have indicated that 26% of these visitors have gone online for the first time after visiting the Internet Bus.
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