Google's primary marketing strategy is deploying superior free products — Search, Gmail, Maps, YouTube, Android, Chrome, Drive — at massive scale to create habitual usage patterns that eliminate the need for traditional consumer acquisition spending. The products market themselves through quality differentiation, and the scale they reach creates the data network effects that maintain quality leadership.
Default Placement Agreements
Google pays approximately $26 billion annually (per DOJ trial disclosures) to Apple, Samsung, Mozilla, and wireless carriers for default search engine placement on devices and browsers — the most significant single marketing expenditure in the company's history and the arrangement now under regulatory challenge as an illegal monopoly maintenance mechanism.