The search engine marketing world was shocked for a second when Search Engine Round Table discovered an image advertisement in the search results at Google: The Bourne Ultimatum is advertising on Google search with a still shot of the movie:
At 77 we don’t think this is a permanent change in their advertising methods. Google has been doing the joint advertising campaign with The Bourne Ultimatum for a while now – on the website ‘The ultimate search for Bourne’ Google has advertised since late April – and it seems this is an exception to prove the rule that, for a long time to come, there will not be any other display advertisements on the Google search page.
Showing an image ad only for the company it is collaborating with might also give Google a leg up when they negotiate deals with other (movie) companies in the future. How much would you pay to be the only company to show display advertising on the Google search pages?