Google's Big Marketing Push Pays Off for its Pixel Phone Over Holiday
Company says demand for the phone exceeded expectations. But Google's TV spending more than doubled to get there.
Google products, including the Pixel XL and Pixel, center, during a product launch in San Francisco, on Oct. 4, 2016.
Photographer: Michael Short/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
Ads for Google's Pixel phone were everywhere this holiday: Splashed across glossy magazines, the front of the New York Times website and spinning on TV during National Football League games.
That aggressive marketing push produced a decent debut quarter for the smartphone, the first high-end device Google made itself, according to analysts and industry insiders. The early traction came at a cost though. The online search juggernaut more than doubled its TV ad budget over the holidays to push Pixel and its new Home speaker, according to one research firm.