Google’s Impact
in Spain

Economy

Helping Consumers

Business &
Innovation

Workers &
Productivity

The research for this report and the period it covers took place before the recent Covid-19 pandemic. Our modelling and polling sought to quantify Google’s impact in the year 2019. While it is too early to be certain of the long-term economic impact of the pandemic, in the last few months we have seen how digital tools can help families stay informed and connected, and businesses adapt to new ways of working.

12 ways that Google helped and supported Spaniards in their everyday lives in 2019

Google supports the economic and sustainable growth of Spain

1. In total, we estimate Google’s products support between €7.2 to €10.2 billion a year in economic activity. This is equivalent to around 1% of Spanish GVA, or supporting 170,000 jobs.

2. Google is helping people find jobs and learn new skills. Every year, 68% of 18-24 year old Search users use it to find a job, and 65% to get advice on their CV. 49% of Google Search users use it at least once a month to learn a new skill.

3. Google has been a carbon-neutral company since 2007 and it has matched its entire annual electricity consumption with renewable energy since 2017.

Google creates products that are helpful and valued by everyone

4. You would have to compensate the average Spaniard €45 per month for losing access to Google products - and up to €10,000 a year to completely lose access to the internet. Spaniards save at least 23 hours a year from Google Search compared with other methods of finding information, and 3 hours a year in travel time from Google Maps.

5. The internet is increasingly becoming a way for people to forge and maintain relationships. 64% of Android users use their smartphone or computer to keep in touch with extended family at least once a week, with Android helping support 5.7 million relationships and 8 million friendships that started online.

6. Google is helping shoppers make better decisions, creating a more consumer centric economy. 82% of shoppers think they make better purchasing decisions because of online information, and 93% of businesses think it is harder to get away with poor goods, food or service because of the internet.

Google helps businesses grow and innovate

7. Online search is an important way that customers find businesses. On average, for every €1 businesses invest on Google Ads, they receive €8 back in profit.

8. Small businesses rely on digital products from Google and competitors. 76% say that the costs of starting a business have reduced substantially or dramatically because of internet tools such as Search. 75% of businesses under 50 people say free search and free office tools are important to them being able to compete with bigger players.

9. Google platforms are enabling new types of business. We estimate that Android developers generate €150 million in annual revenue for the Spanish economy, while the Android ecosystem supports 72,000 jobs in Spain.

Google helps workers be more productive, learn new skills and develop their careers

10. Google is making workers more productive. Almost a half of workers agreed that search engines make their work easier and save time. We estimate that Google services are delivering at least €17 billion a year in business time savings for the Spanish economy.

11. Artificial Intelligence and digital transformation has the potential to boost the economy in Spain by 13% by 2030, boosting average growth rates by an average 1.16 percentage points a year. 84% of Spaniards believe that computers have become noticeably smarter in recent years, with 56% believing that we will be able to use AI to automate many of their daily tasks in the next 20 years. If we could use AI to take over just 10% of the average worker’s administrative tasks, it would save them the equivalent of 20 hours in work time a year.

12. Google makes available to the entire population an immense range of accessible and useful information to achieve the 17 Sustainable Development Goals and their 169 corresponding goals. The United Nations General Assembly adopted in September 2015 the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, an action plan in favor of people, the planet and prosperity, which also intends to strengthen universal peace and access to Justice.

Introduction - Google’s impact in Spain

The internet has created an era of unprecedented consumer and business choice

In 2018, for the first time, more than half the world’s population had access to the internet.¹ Every day, around 900 million gigabytes of new data are created - the equivalent of 30 trillion digital photos.²

While we often talk about the benefits the internet has brought consumers through lower prices and greater transparency, even more important has been the sheer increase in choice and variety. An online retailer today can offer over 500 million products, while over 500 hours of new content is uploaded to YouTube alone every minute.³ One academic estimate from relatively early in the internet’s history suggested that, for example, for the book industry, the gains from increased choice are 7-10 times as large as the gains from lower prices or increased competition.⁴ For the first time, anyone with a smartphone or an online internet search engine can access much of the world’s literature, science, movies, music, news, or games.

But while it has been transformational for consumers, the internet has also radically expanded choices for businesses. Just as consumers can find goods from anywhere in the world, businesses can tap new markets for their services too. This has enabled new types of globally oriented businesses - from small manufacturing firms to new types of content creators.

Google helps people get things done, and grows the economy

Google’s mission is to “organise the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” As a gateway to the internet for many people, Google’s products like Search, YouTube, and Android have made it possible to navigate the cornucopia of new information created by the internet.

In this report, Google commissioned Public First to seek to both better understand and quantify the ways in which their products help and enable Spanish people and businesses:

How Google’s products support economic growth in Spain. We look at the overall economic impact of Google in Spain.

The different ways Google’s products help individuals and families in their everyday lives. We explore how Google’s products help people learn, save time, and better connect with their friends and family.

How Google helps businesses grow and innovate. We look at how Google is making it easier for small companies to connect with customers worldwide, increasing consumer power and enabling entirely new types of business.

How Google helps people be more productive, learn new skills and develop their careers. We look at how workers are using Google products to get more done, how Google Search is an increasingly important way for people to find jobs and the potential from artificial intelligence to further enable workers to be even more productive.

Much of the value created by Google is not included in traditional economic statistics

Many of the most important products of the internet are completely open for anyone to use, without any monetary charge - including many of Google’s leading services, such as Google Search, YouTube and Android.

Traditional economic statistics measure the value of a business or a product by the increases in economic transactions they create - in other words, by how much we have paid for something. That means they do not pick up many of the positive impacts created by Google’s products - from saving us time around the home, to making it easier to communicate with distant relatives. Other studies have calculated that if you included the value provided by all open internet services in GDP, it would boost the growth rate by 0.7 percentage points a year, while a recent paper by ADEI estimated that you would have to pay the median €10,000 a year to completely lose access to the internet.⁵

In total, measured traditionally, we estimate that Google products are supporting at least €10.2 billion in economic activity for local businesses.

As important as this traditional economic value, however, is the value created and time saved in everyday life. We found that the total consumer surplus of Google’s products in Spain is around €45 per month for the median person.

How we quantified Google’s impact in Spain

Traditional economic statistics often do not take full account of the full benefits of the digital economy, such as saved time or the increased opportunities that seamless, rapid access to information can bring. This would also have been true of the printing press or TV. But just because something is hard to measure, it does not mean that it is unimportant.

In this paper, we sought to use a range of different methods to quantify the economic impact and help provided by Google Search, YouTube, Android and other Google products:

To start, building on the precedent of previous Google impact reports,⁶ we used traditional economic modelling built upon third-party estimates of Google’s Spanish market size, potential returns on investment (ROI) and productivity enhancements to measure the economic activity driven by Google Search, Google Ads, AdSense, YouTube, Android and Google Cloud.

In order to build a broader picture of the benefits, we conducted extensive public polling to ask individuals and businesses how they made use of Google products, and what difference they made to their leisure, work and society. Working with the panel provider Dynata, we polled a nationally-representative sample of 1,005 adults and 518 senior business managers in small, medium and large businesses across Spain, asking them 50 and 23 questions respectively about their experience using Google and other online products. Public First is a member of the British Polling Council, and full tables for all the data used in this report is available to download from our website. [LINK TO BE INSERTED]

Finally, we explored 34 in-depth case studies of how businesses and individuals across the different regions and industries of Spain are using Google to power their business.

We go into greater depth on our methodology in the last chapter, which explores how it compares and contributes to the wider debate on measuring the value created by the Internet. The full technical details are given in an appendix at the end of the report.

While Google commissioned this report from Public First, all economic estimates are derived from official, third party and proprietary information.

Google supports the economic growth of Spain

The value of Google products in the economy

How Google supports growth

When we think of the economic activity driven by the Internet, we often focus on the creators of the software and hardware we use as consumers - the maker of our latest gadget or app.

In reality, however, the indirect impact of new technology is much more economically important than the direct revenue of its creators. What makes technology important is its ability to catalyse higher productivity for businesses and workers across all sectors in the economy.

In this report, we focus on three ways in which Google products and services have boosted economic growth in Spain:

They have made it easier for local businesses to connect with customers in Spain and worldwide. According to our business poll, 87% of Spanish businesses believe that online search is now an important way consumers find them, being more important than local (68%), print (58%), and television advertising (49%).
They have provided underlying platforms for new economic ecosystems and types of companies. The Android ecosystem alone, for example, is supporting 72,000 jobs in Spain.
They have boosted the productivity of individual workers and businesses. While we have not included this value in our headline estimate of the economic activity supported by Google, we estimate that the enhanced productivity from Google Search and Apps is helping save Spanish businesses at least €17 bn a year.

The economic impact of Google

Measured conservatively, we estimate that Google products support at least €10.2 bn of economic activity for Spanish businesses. If we assumed standard economic wide multipliers, that is the equivalent of around 170,000 jobs.

This estimate is built upon third party estimates of ad revenues in Spain, and, as such, may be an underestimate of the full value created by Google in Spain.⁷

As a company, Google’s primary source of revenue is advertising, and a significant amount of the value we estimate comes from Search and Google Ads (€9.7 bn annually).

Over the last five years, the economic activity driven by Google Search and Google Ads has grown by 59% in nominal terms.

This value is generated right across the country.

Google Search and Ads Economic Impact in Spain (bn)

Google contribution to GVA by region

The impact of Google products such as Search is experienced by businesses of all sizes in Spain. As part of our business poll, we asked businesses how important different technologies were to the operating of their business. No matter their size, they saw search engines as crucial: a company with one employee was nearly as likely to say search engines were very important (46%) as businesses with more than 250 (51%).

Importance of online search for companies in Spain by number of employees

The same is true across sectors. Over half of the professional service companies that operated in sectors such as finance, insurance and ICT we spoke were as likely to describe online search as highly important (53%). At the same time, 47% of companies in more industrial sectors such as construction, transport and manufacturing saw it as important too.

Importance of online search for companies in Spain by sector

Across different types of business, search and other online tools are helping businesses connect with new customers, and improve their productivity.

Take the tourism industry. According to the World Travel and Tourism Council, the tourism industry is Spain’s largest in terms of GDP and jobs - supporting €176 bn, or 15% of GDP in 2018. Spain is the world’s most popular destination for tourists, hosting over 80 million visitors a year.⁸

In our polling we discovered that Google tools were now an important tool used by tourists from right across Europe and the Middle East to help them navigate around, find things to do and translate across languages. 86% of Spanish Google Search users use it at least once a year to help them research a holiday.

Google creates products that are helpful and valued by everyone

Google makes everyday life easier, freeing up valuable time

The importance of extra time

Since 1976, the average working hours in the workplace in Spain fell by over 16%, from 39 to 33.⁹ As important as the decline in working hours in the office, however, has been a decrease in time spent doing work inside the house. In 1900, data from the US shows that an average household would spend 58 a week preparing meals, cleaning and doing laundry. The arrival of new domestic technologies such as the clothes washer, vacuum cleaner and the refrigerator helped significantly reduce the time needed for housework. By 2015, the average time spent on those same chores was less than eight hours.

Unlike the increase in productivity in the workplace, this increase in leisure time does not directly show up in official GDP statistics. Nevertheless, by significantly freeing up time, these new technologies increased leisure time, allowing households to spend more time catching up, relaxing or pursuing their other projects.

Today, it is increasingly digital technologies that are freeing up time in the household. In this section, we look at the value of the time saved by Google products such as Search, Google Maps, and Google Assistant. In total, we estimate that Google products are saving at least 26 hours a year - slightly more than a day of free time.

Saving time with Google Search and Google Assistant

Making information easier to access is making a significant difference to people’s lives. Before the arrival of the search engine, the only way to get the answer to a question might be to ask a friend or drive to the library.

When we asked Spaniards why they used Google Search:

Speed

80%

of Search users said speed: it saves them time

Coverage

77%

of Search users said coverage: it provides information not available in other ways

Convenience

64%

of Search users said convenience: it is easier or as easy as alternatives

In total, it is estimated that users save at least 23 hours a year from Search compared with other methods of finding information because it is faster and easier to access.¹⁰

But this number is likely to be a lower bound on the time saved by Google Search. If you included the time saved by applying the new information from Google – trying out a new recipe, or learning a new skill – the time saved would be even greater.

At the same time, 45% of Spaniards had tried using an Artificial Intelligence personal assistant (such as Siri, Google Assistant, or Cortana) and 16% now used them on a daily basis.

Google Assistant

Google launched its Google Assistant on the 1st November 2017 in Spain. Google Assistant is a virtual assistant available on mobile devices, smart speakers and smart displays designed to help people get more things done by just using their voice. It supports requests from remembering where the user parked the car and turning off the lights to finding the soccer fixtures.

The Assistant helps users to get more things done with their phone while they are on the go (calling without touching the phone, controlling music with the voice), at work (setting alarms, quickly finding information on the web), and at home with speakers and smart displays (step by step guide to cook recipes, controlling the lights and TV).

Google Assistant is able to help users comply with these types of tasks in an easier manner, but it is also evolving everyday, for example, Google recently introduced a new feature called interpreter mode that translates your conversations in real time across 26 languages.

Saving time with Google Maps

Until recently, we relied on atlases and paper maps to find new places. We may also have got into arguments about directions while driving, or been worried about going to unknown locations on our own.

Today, we find that Google Maps and other location apps have made it easier for people to find restaurants and businesses, get around in new cities, and get to places more quickly and easily. 63% of Spanish Google Maps users use it at least once a week and 26% use it daily.

When we asked a series of questions about why people used Google Maps, we saw that saving time was very common:

64%

of Google Maps users regularly¹¹ used it to get directions while travelling

63%

of Google Maps users regularly used it to stop them getting lost

47%

of Google Maps users regularly used it to avoid traffic congestion or public transport delays

In total, we estimate that the use of Google Maps saves the average Spaniard three hours a year.

Percentage using Google Maps to...

Google is being used by people of all ages to learn new skills

Google helps people learn

We found that the majority of Spaniards, whatever age, are using Search to find new information, helping create a culture of lifelong learning. 89% of Search users say they are more likely to look something up when they are unsure about it than when before search engines existed.

Google Scholar: access to the world’s best research

Dr. Juan Margalef-Bentabol, Mathematical physicist researcher at Penn State University

From science and history to economics, Google Scholar helps people access research and knowledge. It is a simple way to search for academic literature across sectors and disciplines: articles, theses, books, abstracts and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories, universities and other web sites. Some studies have found Google Scholar to have both better sources and to be more usable than other methods of finding academic papers.¹²

Juan is a postdoctoral researcher in mathematical physics at Penn State University. He began his academic studies at the Complutense University of Madrid, where he majored in Mathematics and Physics. He was awarded the second National prize in mathematics and has won several prizes for young researchers like the Arquimedes award of the Spanish Ministry of Education. Later on, he completed his Ph.D. in mathematical physics at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid with several research stays in Germany, Brazil, Austria, and Belgium.

Throughout his research, he has been a very active user of Google Scholar. "It makes it very easy to keep track of your research interests and what others in the field are doing with just one click. It also provides an excellent way to know new researchers. That is why I always keep my profile updated! It is a great platform to make myself known".

So far, he has published 12 papers (plus 5 submitted papers) in areas covering gravity, cosmology, geometry, dynamical systems, and algebra. Juan is also very engaged with science policy as the former president of La Facultad Invisible, a think tank defending the public University system of Spain that works alongside the National Government, University authorities, and student associations. He is also well known in the science communication community of Spain as he was a finalist in the international contest of scientific monologues FameLab 2018 (UK). After that, he has participated in several science communication events worldwide and is a proud member of BigVan Science, a group of scientific stand-up comedian.

Google’s Education Programmes

Miguel Ujeda Gálvez, leader of GEG Spain.

Since great students are motivated by great teachers, Google wants to create products designed for the classroom that help educators do what they do best, even better.

Our solution is built for learning and includes easy-to-manage, affordable devices like Chromebooks and ChromeOS tablets, productivity tools like G Suite for Education with Classroom, and limitless educational content in Google Play for Education.

Google believes that with the right tools, teachers can inspire curiosity and students can discover and learn better together, from wherever they are.

In Spain, day after day, there are more and more educational institutions and education councils that have adopted Google for Education technology as a support to transform learning from new active methodologies also aligned with the development of the necessary skills or abilities of the 21st Century. As relevant data, Spain represents the first country in Europe where more teachers (more than 4k) have been certified as educators in the Google for Education environment and the second worldwide after the USA.

GEG Spain stands for Google Educators Group in Spain. GEG Spain is the most active GEG in all Europe and one of the most active in the world and holds events of more than 400 teachers whose mission is to share and empower other teachers with the best use cases of technology adoption from pedagogy and to improve learning.

“We are a professional learning community where the main objective is to distribute the leadership of change in education using technology as an accelerator. We are a non-profit community, very active, which in the last year we have gathered, in various events, more than 1100 educators and released 80 educational experiences under a Creative Commons license.”

While not every use of Search will be serious - 18% of Spanish users say they use Google Search at least daily to find a piece of trivia - the majority of Spanish users say that regularly use Search to help with their everyday activities:

47%

of Search users regularly use Google Search to find a business, and 59% to research a big purchase

47%

of Search users regularly use it to research medical and health issues, and 26% to look up a gym or local fitness activities

45%

of Search users regularly use it to research a political candidate or issues, and 29% in total have used it to find where they need to go to vote

Most popular uses for Google Search in Spain (size=popularity)

Google Arts and Culture

Google Arts & Culture puts over 1,800 museums from 70 countries at your fingertips, giving a platform to over 400,000 artworks and a total of 6 million photos, videos, manuscripts and other documents of art, culture and history. It’s a free, immersive way to explore art, history and wonders of the world from Van Gogh’s bedroom paintings to Mandela’s prison cell. The Google Arts & Culture app is free and available on the web, on iOS and Android.

In March 2019, Google Arts & Culture launched its first ever program dedicated to food culture as intangible heritage, in partnership with the Real Academia de Gastronomía: Spain: An Open Kitchen' with over 70 exhibitions, the voices of more than 60 food experts and over 2,000 images, sketches and videos- including some, like Ferran Adrià's creative notebooks, made public for the very first time, it's the largest program of its kind. The launch was publicly endorsed by two ministers - Minister of Agriculture and Minister of Tourism - at the launch event hosted in Madrid. To make this story relevant to a millennial audience, we also collaborated with famous chefs and YouTube creators: Samantha Vallejo - Spain Masterchef judge - decoded the history behind iconic Spanish dishes with YouTuber creator Kikillo, and Ferran Adrià explored creativity in the world of gastronomy with four YouTube creators.

Helping teen Spaniards become savvy news consumers through Infórmate

Google has launched a project to train teens in media literacy and critical thinking to assess the veracity of the information they read, create and share it online. This partnership with the Fundación de Ayuda contra la Drogadicción (FAD) and the Spanish Government is intended to reach 30,000 students by the end of 2020.

When they do find information, the majority of them find Search useful. 67% of Search users agree that Search helps solve their problem most of the times, compared to 6% who thought that it was usually a waste of time or 12% as a way to procrastinate. Search is also ranked as among the most trusted sources of information, second only to official government publications.

YouTube uses: popularity and frequency

Many people find it easier to learn through video rather than text. Like Search, YouTube is increasingly a medium through which people learn more about the world, pursue their hobbies or get help with day to day tasks. Worldwide, there are over 1 billion views of learning-related content on YouTube every day.¹³

We found that:

Over three quarters of YouTube users use it at least once a year to help with cooking (86%), and over two thirds to help with home maintenance (82%).
YouTube is enabling new types of content: 56% of YouTube users say they have used it at least once a year to watch a vlogger, and 50% to watch a video game stream.
52% of YouTube users regularly use it to watch commentary on the news or political events, and two thirds (45%) to learn about fitness or health.

Fighting hate and intolerance online through Somos más

Fernando Grande-Marlask, Interior Minister

Somos más

“Somos más” is the Spanish chapter of YouTube “Creators for Change” program, it fights hate speech and radical content. It supports creators who are tackling social issues and promoting awareness, tolerance, and empathy on their YouTube channels.

Google has collaborated with six ministries of the Spanish Government and other third sector organisations and associations,achieving training people to become more active in online communities, fighting hate speech and radical content.

Working with the Government, Google has trained more than 60.000 teens across more than 500 education institutions from 17 regions.

Keeping in touch with friends and family

The arrival of the smartphone has made it possible to keep in constant connection with the people who matter to you - whether through text, photo or video. It has never been easier to find a group of friends who share your interests, no matter how obscure, or to keep in contact with family who are far away. In Spain, Android helps many people connect.¹⁴

Ninety years ago, the cost of making a three minute phone call between New York and London in today’s prices would be over $500: more than the average worker’s weekly salary.¹⁵ While some form of postal service has existed since the ancient world, in practice trying to keep in contact with distant relatives has historically been expensive, slow and unreliable.

Today, the internet has made seamless, instant communication possible. People can email, message each other, or talk to each other on video for as long as they like, often for free. Over three-quarters (81%) of Spaniards agree that the Internet has made it easier to more regularly keep in contact with their relatives.

We found that the internet is increasingly becoming a way that people forge and maintain relationships, creating significant consumer value - and much of this is taking place through Android and Gmail. From our polling:

92%

of Android users use their smartphone or computer to keep in touch with friends at least once a week

33%

of Android users say they have met a current or former friend online

23%

of Android users say they have met a current or former romantic partner online

In total, that conservatively implies an additional 8 million relationships and 5.6 million friendships that started online.

At the same time, we use digital communications to stay in touch both with our extended family and close family through the day:

66%

of Android users use their smartphone or computer to keep in touch with their close family at least daily

64%

of Android users use their smartphone or computer to keep in touch with extended family at least once a week

46%

of those who never see their extended family in person are able to keep in touch with them with their smartphone and computer

Google products are used near equally by people of all incomes, ages, and backgrounds

Over the last twenty five years, the Internet and smartphones have gone from being niche products to almost universal adoption - one of the fastest rates of adoption of any consumer product ever. This has seen them not just taken up by the usual early adopters of technology - roughly male, wealthy and highly educated - but across society, by people from all backgrounds.

Like the internet as a whole, Google’s products are highly egalitarian. In the data from our poll, those with higher incomes were a third more likely than those with low incomes to regularly drive a car, or read a book for pleasure. By contrast, there was no statistically significant difference in how likely they were to use Google Search. Our polling data found clear evidence that Android was more likely to be used by those on low incomes than other smartphone platforms.

Use of Google products by income (1 = national average)

Similarly, Google’s products are widely used by both men and women, and there is little age gradient for Google Search. While the young are slightly more likely to regularly use YouTube, the majority of Google’s products saw high usage across ages.

Use of Google products by age (1 = national average)

We saw clear data that Google’s products were being used by people from all backgrounds to help out with their everyday life:

39% of Google Search users over 65 regularly used it to research a medical issue, and 92% of Android users over 65 regularly use their phone or computer to keep in touch with friends.
43% of Google Search users with only a basic education regularly use it to learn a new skill, and 73% of YouTube users with only a basic education regularly use it to learn something.

The value of Google products in daily life

In this chapter, we have explored some of the ways in which Google products help people in their daily lives: saving time, making it easier to find information, and helping people to keep in touch.

There are all kinds of values that often do not get picked upon by traditional economic impact studies, which have tended to focus on the impact of a company or product on GDP.

GDP itself, however, has never included everything we value or every type of work we do. Taken literally, GDP takes no account of changes in our leisure time or the amount of work we do in non-market roles, such as housework or looking after family. The majority of the kinds of help we have explored in this study do not increase GDP in the way we normally measure it - but most people would agree that they are important.

How can we better understand and quantify the value created by Google in daily life?

One way to do this is to look at changes in the consumer surplus. The consumer surplus is defined by economists as the difference between the amount a consumer would be willing to pay and the amount they actually do pay.

This is particularly relevant for products such as Google’s, which are largely provided to the user without monetary charge. Just because their price is zero, however, does not mean that they are worthless.

In order to better understand the value of Google, we used two types of methodology to create new estimates for the consumer surplus of its core products:

Where possible, we produced estimates of the value of the time saved from using Google products such as Google Search, Google Maps and YouTube
We used our consumer polling data to explore what the minimum amount you would have to compensate them for losing access to each product, building on the methodology previously established by other leading economists¹⁶

By combining those two methods, we produced a conservative estimate that that the total consumer surplus of Google’s products in Spain is around €45 per month for the median person:

For Google Search, the total consumer surplus is equivalent to €26.7 bn.
For YouTube, the total consumer surplus is €17.5 billion a year.
For Google Maps, the total consumer surplus is €4.9 billion a year.

Consumer Surplus (bn)

The total consumer surplus is equivalent to over 3.9% of GDP, the equivalent in size of half the manufacturing industry’s contribution to GDP.¹⁷

In addition, we estimate that the total consumer surplus from Android smartphones in Spain is worth €51 billion a year or €334 per month for the median household.¹⁸

In order to test the validity of our results, we also ran several other tests.

As well as asking how much the average Spaniard would have to be compensated to give up just Google Search, we also asked how much they would have to be compensated to give up access to all search engines. We found that, on average, you would have to compensate the average Spaniard by €2,260 to give up access to all search engines, as compared to €1,710 for just Google on its own.

This puts our results in line with another recent study using the minimum compensation methodology by ADEI, which found that you would have to compensate the average Spaniard €4,000 to lose access to all search engine and €10,000 to lose access to the internet altogether.¹⁹

Our estimates also found that this consumer surplus is significantly higher than for other consumer products. Indeed, when we asked people to choose from a range of things they would least like to give up, we found that Spaniards were more reluctant to give up search engines than indoor plumbing and would rather lose access to a car than give up their smartphone.

Together, this evidence suggests that traditional statistics like GDP are doing a poor job of measuring the value created by the Internet. Other studies have found that if the value of free internet services are included within GDP, it would increase the recent rate of GDP by the equivalent of 0.7 percentage points a year.²⁰ We explore more how our findings fit into the literature in the last chapter.

Google helps businesses grow and innovate

The referral traffic driven by Google is a highly valuable source of revenue for Spanish businesses

The evolution of advertising has always been closely tied to changes in the wider structure of the economy. As advertising has become more personalised, targeted and immediate, it has driven growth and innovation in the wider economy: enabling new types of businesses to connect with customers, and providing a new source of revenue to fund others.

The first adverts were inherently local - as far back as Roman times, there is evidence of signposts and posters being used to drive customers to local businesses. With the 20th century came mass media, bringing an expansion and infusion of new voices. Genre entertainment (such as Westerns, situation comedies, and news shows) was largely premised and funded by the ability to define audience segments as well as generate scale, and sell advertising on that basis. Then radio joined newspapers, TV joined radio and mass-market magazines.

Likewise, advertising on the internet is continuing to drive growth and innovation:

Making it possible for small businesses to more easily reach customers worldwide.
Funding new types of content, including websites, blogs, and video.

At the heart of Google’s business model for most of its products is advertising. Google’s key innovation in the advertising space was using data to:

Help advertisers reach people at the best possible moment;
Help them ensure that their euros were well spent;
Enabling niche businesses to target those with very specific interests.

That means fewer, better ads for the customer - and a much higher rate of return for the business advertising.

While the direct impact of Google Ads is important for Spanish businesses, even more important is the organic referral provided by Google Search. In our polling, businesses in Spain estimated that online search was the most important way of customers finding them, ahead of word of mouth. 89% of the businesses we spoke to agreed that thanks to search engines, it was far easier for local customers and clients to find them.

On average, Google calculates that for every euro businesses spend on Google Ads, they receive back €8 back in profit. To start, each business receives on average back €2 for every €1 they spend. This in turn is further boosted by traffic that comes through organic search, with other estimates suggesting that businesses receive around five clicks on their search results for every one click on their ads.²¹

That means the majority of the value created by Google advertising is captured by businesses and their customers. In total, our estimates suggest that Google Search and Ads are driving €9.7 bn in total of economic activity for businesses in Spain.

As before this estimate is built upon third party estimates of ad revenues in Spain - Google did not give us any new financial information - and, as such, may be an underestimate of the full value created by Google in Spain.²²

It is not only businesses that benefit from the traffic driven by Google Search and Ads. The referral traffic provided by Google Search is an important driver of attention for non-profits too, as we will see below.

Google Ad Grants

Google.org has a global, five-year goal to award $1 billion in grants and contribute 1 million employee volunteer hours. It works across education, economic opportunity, and inclusion and finds partners and programmes in different countries that will help people and businesses. Throughout this document some of the relevant programmes supported by Google have been highlighted.

Google Ad Grants connects people and nonprofits through free Google Ads. Its mission is to provide additional support and services to help nonprofits and causes, and encourage them in driving advertising results and greater social impact through high quality online advertising.

Using the targeted Ad Grants campaigns, hundreds of nonprofits can reach people who want to help those in need, and people looking for work, at the right time, and successfully move them to donate or apply.

Google Ad Grants have allocated $3 billion worth of free online advertising through in-kind Google Ads to over 27,000 organisations in 30 countries across Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Since 2006 Google Ad Grants have allocated $154.7m worth of free online advertising through in-kind Google Ads to organisations in Spain.In 2018 alone, Google provided $14m of free advertising to around 800 nonprofitsfrom Spain through the Google Ad Grants programme.

Google Search and Ads have made it much easier for local and international customers to find Spanish companies

Helping businesses export

One of the biggest transformations of the internet is that businesses can reach anywhere across the globe. At the same time, it has made it easier for small businesses to compete with larger enterprises – meaning that organisations no longer have to commission expensive TV or print advertising campaigns, but can target customers much more clearly.

Tools like Google Ads, Analytics and Market Finder have made it much easier for businesses of any size to reach new customers wherever they are based. 89% of the businesses we spoke to agree that compared to the time before search engines, it was now far easier for global customers or clients to find their business.

Looking only at businesses who said that a majority of their customers came from abroad, 82% agreed that their business would have significantly fewer international clients without online search and online advertising.

Google Market Finder

Google partnered with the Spanish Institute for Foreign Trade (ICEX) in 2018 to launch Google Market Finder. The tool helps Spanish SMEs identify export markets for their products and evaluate the costs and opportunities of entering new markets.

Google Market Finder is a free service for businesses interested in expanding internationally. It provides detailed insights into which international markets are best suited to your product or service, plus useful tools and guides on how to prepare your business and successfully market it online.

Google My Business

Carranza

María Eleuteria Ruiz founded Carranza, a family store, based in Madrid, specialized in fountain pens and fine art, in 1988. Fifteen years ago, together with her husband and son, she started to digitize the business and when Google launched Google My Business she saw a perfect opportunity to continue with the digitization process. "Thanks to Google My Business, we have an online visibility that we did not have before, since customers find us easier and know our schedules. Thanks to that, our clients understand more easily both the product we have and the help we can lend them because our products are very exclusive."

Good treatment and professionalism is one of the main values of Carranza, something that can be read in the reviews they have in Google My Business. "Our goal is that customers when they call us or when they come to the store feel at home and, until now, I think we are achieving it."

Nine Fitness

Javier Melendez is the marketing director at Nine Fitness gym chain. Javier and his partners founded Nine Fitness back in 2014 with the support of football player Fernando Torres and also, in the same year, their website: ninefitness.es was launched. Ever since, the website has been renewed three times. Meanwhile, adding Google Analytics to conduct research to improve the website performance on bringing more traffic especially during the key periods for the sector.

Thanks to the tool, Ninefitness knew what kind of activities interest their users most and that allows them to adapt their gym schedules tailored to their preferences and interests. Hence, several very successful campaigns focusing on our target audience were carried out thanks to the insight brought by the analysis.

Regarding Google My Business, Javier mentioned that it has always been a fundamental tool to have them understand customer feedback. It was also used to analyze the calls received over a period of time and to see how many times the “how to get there” has been used in Google Maps.

Thanks to Google My Business Nine Fitness has experienced a growth in visits over the last three months and has increased the number of new members in 7%.

Think with Google

Think with Google, founded in order to build the Google B2B brand in 2015, is the digital marketing platform reference where marketers, brands and agencies go to discover local consumer insights, industry perspectives, case studies and creative inspiration. With a repository of +800 pieces of content, TwG has a monthly reach over a 30k audience formed by digital marketers, students, brands and agencies.

How did Air Europa improved its presence and increased its sales

Air Europa, a Spanish airline with a presence in more than 50 national and international destinations and a member of the SkyTeam alliance, wanted to increase its presence and increase its sales. On Black Friday, one of the most important festivals to boost sales in the commercial world, the company decided to establish a display strategy in collaboration with the Google team.

In addition to focusing on discounts and offers to generate more demands in celebration of Black Friday, Air Europa also designed a display strategy as the main source of awareness using audience insights, guaranteeing maximum coverage in the main remarketing lists.

With the launch of the campaign, Air Europa achieved a significant increase in results. With an increase of 74% in Display Impressions, 134% improvement in Google Search, and 182% increase in unique users reached, amounting to an improvement in revenue of 209% YoY.

How does Santander bank increased its brand association with the football territory through the collaboration with Google

Banco Santander wanted to increase the brand's association with the world of football since they realised that the markets where they are the most present consist of football super fans. (Europe & Latin America)

With the collaboration of Google, the company was able to conduct deep dive into consumer preferences, interest and behaviour using Google Consumer Surveys. Following up with exploring different format on YouTube, which allow its communication strategy to be maximised and reach all the potential audience. Finally, Brand Lift was used to analyse the brand perception, which revealed a very positive outcome.

The overall brand association with football increased, especially with the result of Spain, UK and Mexico. Spain obtained a 26% increase from Santander Bank. UK, on the other hand, achieved an increase of 14% and Mexico 15%.

Banco Santander improved its notoriety and increased the association of the brand with football thanks to the teamwork carried out with Google teams.

Grow My Store

Grow My Store was one of the most anticipated tool launches for retail in 2019 and given the importance of retail in our market ($320b, #5 in the EU), it was imperative for the Spanish market to have a very strong launch. We created a localized plan with a 360º approach that included: PR, social media, sales teams activation, Think With Google and a launch event - even producing an explanatory video. Results: First country globally to attain over 10k unique page views.

Helping local customers find businesses

It is not just global customers that Google helps businesses reach, but local people too. Tools like Google Maps and Google My Business have made it easier for people locally, regionally, and nationally to find new businesses like restaurants and shops. This can be particularly important to those in out of the way locations.

In our consumer polling, we found that:

62%

of Google Maps users regularly use it to find a local business

70%

of Google Maps users regularly use it to find a local restaurant

52%

of Google Maps users regularly use it to look for something new to try

Google is helping create a more consumer centric Spanish economy

By increasing consumer transparency, Google is helping drive better customer service

By increasing transparency and choice, Google Search and other online tools have increased effective competition - leading to more productive companies and a better quality service for the end customer. In today’s economy, it is much harder for a business to get away with a poor quality good or service.

The people and companies we polled agree: 82% of shoppers think they make better purchasing decisions because of online information, and 93% of businesses think it is harder to get away with poor goods, food or service because of the internet.

This happens not only online, but offline too. 66% of people say they use their phone to research a potential purchase in a shop in the last year. This allows them to avoid products which get poor reviews, and make sure they are paying a good price.

Helping small businesses compete and grow

Given their lower entry costs, internet tools are often particularly important for the productivity of small businesses. Anyone who wanted to start a large export business twenty years ago, would probably have to invest in an international advertising campaign, in-house IT servers and expensive software licences.

In our poll, out of businesses with less than 250 employees we saw:

76%

agreeing that online tools have made it easier for their business to compete with larger enterprises

87%

agreeing that it is now far easier for global customers to find their business

82%

saying that they regularly used a search engine to research new marketing opportunities

Google makes it easier for new companies to compete with established firms

Cheap online tools, cloud computing, and the ability to communicate to customers across the globe have radically reduced the barriers to entry for start-ups, and made it easier for them to grow.

In our poll, out of businesses less than five years old we saw:

77%

agreeing that the costs of starting a business have reduced substantially because of internet tools

88%

agreeing that online tools have made it easier to grow and scale their business

59%

agree that online search advertising is crucial to their business

Google for Startups

Google for Startups Campus Madrid is Google’s physical space for startups, where Google supports founders throughout their journey by connecting them with the best of Google’s products, connections, and best practices.

Google for Startups Campuses are part of a global network including Campus Madrid, Campus London, Campus Tel Aviv, Campus Warsaw, Campus Seoul, Campus São Paulo and since 2019 Campus Tokyo.

Since the opening of Google for Startups Campus Madrid in 2015, 5,606 new jobs have been created by startups in the community.
In 2019 startups from our community in Spain created 1,421 jobs (up by 57.19% from 2018) and raised more than €105min funding (More than €743m since 2015).
37.5% of campus active members in Spain are women
Google for Startups Residency, an equity-free program offering startups personalized mentorship from Google employees and free working space at Campus, launched in Madrid in 2017. 31 startups have participated in the 4 editions of the program so far, and 42% of them had female founders.

Marta Zaragoza and Vicente Solsona, founders of Declarando

Marta Zaragoza worked as a tax specialized lawyer for more than 10 years. During this time, she realized that many freelancers didn’t work with tax advisors due to their high cost. She thought there might be a smart way to automate this, saving time and money. That’s why she started Declarando, an online tax advice platform, with her Co-Founder, Vicente Solsona.

In 2018 they were selected to participate in Google for Startups Residency, so they left Castellon, their hometown in the East coast of Spain, and moved to Madrid to become a part of the program.

Joining Residency helped them attract a lot of visibility and recognition, and access to relevant connections in the startup ecosystem. They could also work with Google mentors and advisors, who helped them define their strategy, optimize their processes, and become the established company they are today.

“Our Residency Advisors showed us how to optimize our Ads campaigns, and helped us improve our SEO, which helped us double our site traffic.

When we joined Residency we had 200 paid clients. 5 months after we got to 800, and had increased our team from 6 to 12 people.

We come from a small region in Spain and we were not connected with all the relevant players in the ecosystem.

Google for Startups gave us a lot of credibility, and referred us for South Summit, where we were finalists and met one of our investors. In 3 months we closed our first round of 525K

Now we have 1,500 paid clients, and we have a 36 people team.

If someone would have told us we would be where we are now, we would have called them crazy. We have overpassed our more optimistic forecasts.”

Google for Startups: Growth Academy

An immersive program for Spain’s most promising scale-up startups to accelerate their businesses with the best of Google: Educational workshops, ongoing 1:1 mentoring sessions with industry experts, and unique networking opportunities with like minded Founders.

The 10 selected startups - Barkyn, Bnext, Declarando, Holded, Howlanders, Holafly, Lolamarket, Singularu, Smartick and ThePowerMBA - receive 4 days of in-person sessions with Googlers at Google for Startups Campus Madrid and 4 weeks of online mentoring.

Bnext

The Bnext team in an internal meeting

Bnext is the first marketplace bank in Spain, an alternative to traditional banking. You can open an account in a few minutes.

“The Growth Lab program helped us get a wider vision of all possibilities that Google's tools can give a startup, while learning about the news to come and plan our strategy accordingly.”

Google’s products are enabling entirely new types of business, such as YouTube Creators

YouTube Creators

For decades publishers, record labels, and TV producers have been besieged by requests from individuals wanting a chance to reach a wide audience. YouTube has provided many with an alternative - giving them a platform to communicate directly to people all over the world. While children used to dream of becoming a film or sports star when they grew up, an increasing number now say their dream is to become a YouTube vlogger.²³

Worldwide, YouTube has a total audience of over 2 billion users, with over 500 hours of content uploaded every minute and one billion hours of content watched every day. This immense audience supports thousands of independent creators. The number of channels with more than one million subscribers globally has grown by more than 65% year on year, and the number of channels earning five figures per year more than 40% year on year.²⁴

YouTube initiatives in Spain

We have already shown that YouTube provides a wide range of benefits for Spaniards who watch it, whether it be for pleasure, learning or business. But YouTube does not just benefit Spanish consumers, it has also helped to launch generations of Spanish YouTubers, who have become successful creators, exporting around the globe. Spanish YouTubers create an enormous range of content, from gaming and vlogging channels to science and documentary broadcasters.

Patry Jordan

Patry is an influencer of the beauty and sports sector with more than 12 million subscribers over her 6 YouTube channels in total. In addition, she has more than 1,000,000 daily views and 30,000,000 monthly visits across all of her channels.

Patry Jordán is an entrepreneur, a fighter and a hardworking person thus she has managed to capture the entire audience who follows her and visualizes her short and didactic videos.

Unicoos

David Calle is the dedicated creator behind Unicoos. This Math and Physics teacher, a telecommunications engineer, began uploading videos to his YouTube channel back in 2011 to make it easier for his students to watch the concepts and exercises as many times as they needed to. This ignited a community and David discovered a passion that complimented his lessons perfectly.

Today, 8 years later, with 200 millions of views and a subscriber base of 1.3M students, David has expanded his virtual teachings to other subjects such as Chemistry, Technology or Technical Drawing. Unicoos has a total staff of 7 people and caters to an audience beyond Spain which includes Argentina, Mexico, Chile or the United States.

In 2017, David was one of the finalists of the Global Teacher Prize and was ranked among the Top 100 Most Creative People In Business according to Forbes magazine. He has published two books (“Never give up” and “How much do the clouds weigh?”), which have been translated into several languages.

itownGamePlay

In 2011, at the age of 26, no job for over a year, iTownGamePlay faced a very difficult time in his life,he had lost 2 very close relatives recently, all combined triggered a very strong anxiety in him. Luckily YouTube appeared in his life as a solution to his problems.

On September 21st, 2011, he created his YT channel which kept his mind busy creating content on the platform, at that time he could not even consider being able to generate revenue with his channel, but he was already getting something even more important, to overcome his anxiety, a more complicated disease than it seems, and with which he has had to learn to deal with ever since.

What was back then a very effective therapy for him, became in 2013 his new job; that need for self-help soon became a way to help other people even those who lived in other countries and certainly at that stage he realised that YouTube had changed his life.

He has traveled throughout Latin America meeting many of his fans at events, so far he has succeeded in being followed by more than 11 Million subscribers, thus making a childhood dream (work playing video games) a reality.

Nowadays YouTube is still his main source of income and favorite entertainment, and he surely expects it to remain so for many more years, because he feels that he still has to give back much more to the platform.

ExpCaseros

Natalia Machuca and Jesús Cibantos (AKA Mayden) are colleagues/partners who decided to start their first YouTube channel back in 2012. After careful consideration they chose to create content that would appeal to a broad young audience and began uploading their fun, educational, DIY and challenge videos under their brand ExpCaseros.

The pair soon saw their efforts take off and with the success of their first channel, they expanded the “family” with ExpCaserosKids, Mayden y Natalia Vlogs or MaydenCraft, among others. With their main channel reaching 10 million subscribers in 2019, ExpCaseros are a household name to millions of youngsters around the world, particularly in Spain and Latin America, where they’ve toured their shows. Natalia and Mayden have published four books about science for children (the fifth will arrive soon).

ExpCaseros have partnered with several brands since the beginning and have notably collaborated with Disney in productions such as The Jaja Super Show, Club Houdini or Mickey Mouse Squad.

DjMaRiiO

“I remember when I bought my first capture card to upload my gameplays in high quality, I spent the little money I had, but gaming was something I loved, a big hobby. My parents used to ask me why I spent so much time in front of the computer, especially, when I started to monetize the videos and I was only earning € 10 a month.

Years later, my big hobby started to become my job, since the channel began to grow little by little and much larger amounts of money were arriving than at the beginning. That growth would keep on growing until today, when I have reached over 5.5M subscribers. I have been able to buy an apartment and a car, and more importantly, I can support and take care of my mum and she does not need to work anymore, which is the most important thing for me. I am very proud as well of the fact that I have been able to organize a charity football match with youtubers in the Santiago Bernabeu stadium, which was live streamed and reached over 300.000 peak concurrent views, I have been with Messi, with Cristiano Ronaldo, with Ronaldinho, and everything is on my YouTube channel as the greatest memories.

Bless the day that YouTube appeared in my life, bless the day on which I decided to buy the capture card and bless the desire I have to work and continue to grow on the platform”.

The economic impact of Android development

Android is the world’s most popular app platform, helping ensure that it has never been easier for app or game developers to deploy and market to customers worldwide.

Globally, over 5.9 million developers target Android first.²⁵ with around 3% of global developers estimated to reside in Spain.²⁶ In total, the Google Play store offers around 2.7 million apps to download,²⁷ with over 75 billion apps downloaded globally from the Google Play store in 2018.²⁸ The average consumer in advanced economies regularly uses over 30 apps, with just under 100 apps installed on their smartphone.²⁹

In Spain, we estimate that Android developers generate €150 million in annual revenue for the Spanish economy. Other estimates have found that, in total, the Android ecosystem supports 72,000 jobs in Spain.³⁰

Mobile App Launchpad and Google Developer Training

The Google Developer Groups (GDGs) are non-profit entities created with the aim of improving the community of technology enthusiasts and increasing knowledge and relationships between people who are dedicated to this area. We create events, conferences and workshops in more than thirty points in Spain, with the aim of spreading knowledge about technology and improving the country's developer landscape. The vast majority of these events are free, and we collaborate with other technological communities (GDE, Women Techmakers, Tech & Ladies, Betabeers, etc.) to make technology in Spain a strong muscle and an asset that contributes to the development of society.

Regarding GDGs network, Spain is the most active country in the European Ecosystem, with the largest number of groups.

Spain leads the European network of active chapters with 33 groups. These groups are critical to support educational activities, not just in the main cities but also in regions where there is limited opportunity to build technological skills.
In particular, Spain is leading the outreach of cloud events in Europe, increasing awareness of Google Cloud Platform. Communities in Spain have organized the biggest number of Cloud Study Jam (41), producing the biggest number of cloud learners (+4 hours training) in Europe (450).
In terms of the worldwide ecosystem, the Spanish ecosystem of GDGs is the sixth most active on diversity activities.
Finally, the communities outperform giving visibility to their activities, being the most active country social media in Hashcode program.

Publishers

AdSense allows publishers - whether multinational news organisations or individual bloggers - to monetise their content through the sale of advertising space on their sites and apps. It allows anyone, no matter their size, to earn revenue for the content they create.

Our modelling finds that in total Google AdSense generated €114 million in 2018 for spanish websites and publishers.

Google News Initiative

To help publishers make the most of digital opportunities, Google established in 2016 the Digital News Innovation Fund (DNI Fund), an initiative to help facilitate innovation in the European news industry. Thus far, more than €12 million has been awarded to 47 Spanish projects involving national, local and hyperlocal newsrooms.

La Voz de Galicia (LVG) founded in 1882 is a newspaper focusing on the local news of Galicia. In 2017 January, the digital edition of LVG was a website with approximately 10 million unique users and 50 million page views. However, the company realised that their growth in audiences did not accompany growth in income, and that they decided to approach DNI fund. Thanks to the participation of DNI fund, the company changed its digital editorial strategy. Understanding that they need to be closer to their readers.

The listening tools provided by DNI fund allowed LVG to understand out readers more, and was the key to their success. Their audience continues to grow. They currently have 11.8 million users, an increase of 25% compared to June 2018, and 75 million page views. (18% growth yoy)

This increase occurs mainly in loyal audience. Besides, LVG also greatly increased the news seen by 35% along with the increase in recirculation within the site by 45%

A related initiative, Google News Lab, has trained 11.400 spanish journalists for free, all over the spanish autonomous communities, on a range of digital tools over the last four years. Lastly, recognising that the ability to analyse news media is more important than ever, Google has invested in a number of ES programmes to enhance news literacy. For instance, Google has joined with the FAPE, the main journalist association in Spain to launch “Jornada Periodismo Siglo XXI” - a news literacy programme to reach free-lance journalists, sometimes older and/or unemployed reporters who are in great need of digital skills. Some of them are organized with local universities and open to students. Moreover, Google News Initiative supported the launch in Spain, at the end of 2018, of Chicas Poderosas, a successful organization which focuses on providing digital and new media skills as well as leadership to women.

Google helps workers be more productive, learn new skills and develop their careers

Google helps workers be more productive

Usage of internet technologies over time

In the last five years, Spanish companies report significant increased adoption of the use of email, smartphones, search engines, online maps, and online office suites - and they expect this adoption to only increase in the next five years.

Like the personal computer (PC) and the spreadsheet a generation before, arguably the most important personal productivity tools of the last generation have been the smartphone and the search engine:

Workers were more likely to use Google Search in an average week for their work than a laptop, desktop computer, Microsoft Office or car.
Just over a quarter of workers said that they used Google Search for over an hour a day on average.
46% of workers agreed that search engines make their work easier and save them timee.

It is not just Search. 36% of individuals say that smartphones make their jobs easier, while 28% of business leaders say that online maps are essential to the running of their business and 51% think the same about an online office suite. A previous Forrester Consulting study estimated that the deployment of G Suite and tools like Docs, Sheets and Slides have the potential to save employees from 15 minutes to 2 hours per week in more efficient collaboration.³¹

The employers we spoke to agreed that the internet has increased productivity and enabled new styles of working:

84%

of the business leaders we polled agreed with the statement “Having access to the Internet makes the employees of my company significantly more productive”

87%

agreed “It is easier for employees to work remotely”

88%

agreed “It is now easier for workers and different teams to collaborate than before thanks to online apps and cloud services”

Increasingly, many companies are turning to cloud providers such as Google Cloud Platform to enable them to grow seamlessly. According to Eurostat data, 22% of Spain enterprises use cloud computing services.³²

On average, businesses have seen a net return of up to €2.5 for every €1 invested in cloud services, with some of the most successful users on Google Cloud users seeing returns of up €10 for every €1 invested. In total, Deloitte estimates have found that Google Cloud has increased productivity in Spain by €96 mn.³³

Given the significant number of workers and businesses who in our polling said they now used and relied on Google products, this is likely to be substantial. We estimate that Google Search and G Suite alone could be creating at least €17 billion a year in business time savings for the Spanish economy.³⁴

Google Cloud

Talgo

Founded in 1942, Talgo is a Spanish manufacturer of intercity, standard, and high-speed passenger trains with a history of innovation. The company was listed on the Madrid Stock Exchange in 2005.

Reasons to use Google Cloud:

Train manufacturer Talgo revolutionizes train maintenance with Google Cloud by streaming sensor data in real time and applying machine learning to stop problems without stopping service.

Results:

Streams data in real time from 2,000 on-board sensors for immediate analysis, anywhere in the world.
Collects 2,000% more data per train, per day than using a previous system.

Uses machine learning for potential savings of over 200 hours a year per train in maintenance inspection time.

Cabify

Operating in Spain, Portugal, and Latin America, Cabify enables its customers to hire a private vehicle and driver through its Cabify smartphone app.

Reasons to use Google Cloud:

Cabify implements Google Cloud for its data pipeline using Google BigQuery, offering its data scientists more up-to-date data and reducing operational burdens with managed services.

Results:

Reduces operational burden with managed services including Google App Engine and Cloud Functions.
Integrates easily with a multi-cloud environment enabling simple date ingestion via Cloud Pub/Sub.
Helps to control costs with on-demand query billing for BigQuery.

Protecting businesses online with cutting-edge security

While the internet has enabled new opportunities for businesses to save time and money, it has also created the potential for new types of risk from data breaches or loss. Data obtained from the study "Cybersecurity in Spain", carried out by Google and The Cocktail Analysis, indicate that main targets of cyber attacks in Spain in 2018 were SMEs and private users, with a total of 102,414 registered incidents.

In Spain, the average cost of a cyber attack on an SME is €35,000 and 60% of SMEs close six months after having suffered a cyber attack.

Investing in cybersecurity in Spain

Bernardo Quintero, founder of VirusTotal

Every day we are more and more connected. Therefore, it is important to educate society about the necessity of protecting ourselves online and knowing how to do it. With the assistance of Cocktail Analysis, Google Spain has prepared a report to understand the current landscape of cybersecurity in Spain better, especially regarding SMEs.

In one of its main conclusions, the report points out that 99.8% of Spain’s business fabric is not considered an attractive target for cyberattackers. This means that almost 3 million small and medium-sized enterprises in Spain are protected poorly or not protected at all against hackers. Only 36% of the SMEs that took part in the survey have established basic security protocols, such as two-steps verification for company emails, and 30% of their websites do not have https protocols.

This current landscape shows that it is necessary to raise awareness regarding better online security. Faced with this challenge, Google has launched a campaign to reinforce cybersecurity in Spain. The three fundamental pillars are:

The ‘Protect your business’ program: Whether it is due to lack of resources, time or awareness, SMEs are the weakest links of the chain when it comes to cyberattacks. Therefore, Google, in collaboration with CEPYMEepyme and INCIBE, plans to offer free on-site training regarding cybersecurity.

The ‘Google for Start-ups Accelerator’ program: Málaga will host this initiative, whose goal is to accelerate eight cybersecurity start-ups (six of them are from Spain). The program will last six months, until March 2020.

At the same time, they are promoting high-level specialized training in cybersecurity to close the gender gap in the field. For this purpose, we are going to sponsor ten grants for women who seek to achieve a Postgraduate Certificate in Reverse Engineering and Malware Intelligence from the University of Málaga.

Google helps people get more done while on the go

The average person in Spain spends around 1.25 hours a day travelling, or over 400 hours a year. Until recently, much of that time would have been wasted.

From podcasts to apps, streaming videos to gaming, the rise of the smartphone has helped make travelling far more entertaining for many people - but often more productive too. Rather than wait to get back to your desk to look up a crucial piece of information or respond to an urgent message, we are now able to act much more in the moment.

In our polling, we saw many ways in which Spaniards were using their smartphone to remain productive while on the go:

Looking up information

62%

of Search users regularly use it to answer a question while on the go

Managing Work

57%

Over half (57%) of Android users regularly use their phone to answer their work email or do other work while on the go

Kept on schedule

66%

on Android users regularly check their calendar while on the go, and 58% used online maps or a calendar reminder to avoid being late to a meeting

Google is helping workers upskill and find new jobs

Helping people find jobs and grow in their career

For over a hundred years, an important goal of public policy has been to help match workers with the right jobs, and once in work, train and improve their skills.

By making it easier to research different options, search engines such as Google Search help improve consumer choice, transparency and competition.

One of the most important markets in which this is true is the labour market. Google Search is increasingly the leading gateway through which workers look for a new position and, once there, seek to improve their skills.

Every year:

44%

of Search users use it to look for new jobs

40%

of Search users use to get advice on their CV

67%

of Search users to learn a new skill

This is particularly true of younger workers. 68% of 18-24 year old Search users and 65% of 25-34 year old Search users say they use it at least once a year to look for a new job, and 63% and 64% respectively to get advice on their CV.

Google Jobs

In May 2018, Google launched their Jobs search feature in Spain. When you search for “jobs near me”, “teaching jobs”, or similar queries you can go to a feature that lets you explore jobs from across the web that meet your needs. You can access to reviews and ratings of the employer and different options to apply for a job, or use a location filter to see jobs in the areas that are convenient for you, and how long it would take to commute to a job from your home.

Google collaborated with 8 job portals that have a local and regional coverage including Hosteleo, Buscador de trabajo.com, Trovit, LinkedIn, Adecco, Opcionempleo, Jobrapido and Jobatus to launch the feature, and all jobs providers can make their job openings discoverable in this experience. Anyone searching for jobs on Google will see postings from these sites and many others from across the web as soon as they’re posted.

Helping managers learn more at work

Like their workforce, business owners and managers are also increasingly turning to Google products to stay on top of trends and opportunities, be aware of what their competitors are doing, and constantly improve their own practices and management.

In our business poll, we found that at least once a month:

84%

used a search engine to learn a new skill

92%

used a search engine to keep up to date with industry trends

88%

used a search engine to research a new business opportunity or competitor

82%

used a search engine to explore new marketing opportunities

87%

used a search engine to research new ways to improve efficiency

In the future, AI will enable workers to be even more productive

In its first twenty years, the majority of value created by Google services came from improved access to information and communication. In the next twenty years, the value created by the application of AI and machine learning to automate routine tasks is likely to be just as important. Google’s CEO has argued that the company is set to move from “a company that helps you find answers to a company that helps you get things done.”³⁵

As industry adapts to the next wave of technologies - Big Data, AI, and advanced robotics - we find that companies across Spain have already incorporated internet technology into their daily operations, decision making, sales and marketing.

Three-quarters of Spanish businesses expect data science and machine learning to be used by a majority of their workers within the next five years.

At the same time, when we asked normal Spaniards:

84% agreed that computers have become noticeably smarter in recent years.
54% agreed that AI is likely to be good for our future economy and society.

While it is hard to predict the future reach of a specific company, we can more confidently predict the potential of AI and the digital industry for the economy as a whole.

13%

In total, our estimates suggest that AI has the potential to boost the economy in Spain by 13% by 2030, boosting average growth rates by an average 1.2 percentage points a year

That is the equivalent of an additional €14 bn in GDP, or an additional €300 per Spaniard, each and every year.

As well as boosting living standards, AI is also likely to make work itself more pleasant - freeing up time for employees to spend on more creative or meaningful tasks.

As one example of this, the average employee in Spain today spends over three quarters of an hour a day in administrative tasks, such as filling out paperwork, submitting expenses or booking a meeting room.

Through products such as Assistant and Duplex, Google has already demonstrated technology that can suggest standard email replies, find a suitable slot for a meeting or book an appointment.

54% of those we polled agreed that if computers took over part of their current job, that there would still be other tasks available that they could spend more time on.

If we could use AI to take over just 10% of the average worker’s administrative tasks, we estimate that it would save them the equivalent of 20.3 hours in work time a year – and by itself boost productivity by 1.2%.

Preparing people for the jobs of the future

As digital technology becomes more central to the future of the economy, taking over old kinds of tasks, the importance of digital skills has also grown in importance. Only 19% of those we polled disagreed with the idea that within twenty years a significant proportion of the tasks they did for their job could be automated using current software.

While Spain scores above average on the European Union’s Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI), it is lagging further behind for digital skills - with only just half of 16-74 years olds possessing basic digital skills (55%), and a relatively low proportion of ICT specialists.³⁶

In order to help improve the supply of digital and business skills, Google has launched the Google Actívate programme, training more than 500,000 people throughout Spain since 2014.

Google Actívate

The European Union notes that in just two years 45% of the jobs will be related to the digital environment. While the demand for professionals with digital knowledge is growing by around 3% per year, the number of new ICT graduates and qualified ICT workers is not maintained. In Europe there is a digital knowledge gap in the workforce. In fact, it is estimated that in 2020, almost 900,000 jobs will not be filled in Europe due to lack of professionals in these areas.

To address the growing workforce skills gap in the region, and to help ensure that the opportunities created by technology are available to all, Google Spain launched in 2014 Google Actívate, an initiative aimed at anyone who wants to prepare for future job opportunities, to advance in their professional careers, to learn how to start or grow their business. Google Actívate offers 33 online courses and different face-to-face courses throughout Spain, totally free, covering a variety of topics: artificial intelligence, digital marketing, social networks, e-commerce, video, entrepreneurship, personal productivity and more. Since its launch, Google Actívate has trained more than 500,000 people (47% women), of which more than 61,000 found work / internships or improved their working conditions and more than 32,500 companies have reported growth for the purpose of profit, income or number of customers.

Google works on this initiative hand in hand with Fundación Incyde, 30 public universities, la Escuela de Organización Industrial, UGT, Fundación Santa María la Real, IEI de la Universidad de Alicante, Accem, Adisli, Cáritas, CEAR, Cruz Roja, Inserta Empleo, Secretariado Gitano, Fundación Tomillo, Fundación Universidad Empresa, Ayuda en Acción, Fundación CIDEAL, Fundación Altius, Centro de Atención a Refugiados y Asilados (CAR Madrid).

Google Actívate offers Ana the tools to pursue her passion and start a business

Ana Carpintero, founder of Somos Océano

For Ana, the financial crisis was a life-changing experience. Previously working in her dream job in the fashion industry in Madrid, she suddenly found herself unemployed and frustrated. She returned to her hometown of Vigo in Galicia, apprehensive about what the future had in store. “You feel a bit useless, like you don’t belong anywhere,” says Ana. “But I knew I had to do something for myself. And I realised: this is the moment … I have to do it now.”

The idea to start her own Galicia-inspired clothing line was born from her love of her hometown and her lifelong passion for fashion. Ana signed up for an online marketing course with Google Actívate, which gave her key insight and skills, including SEO, search engine marketing, social media and web analytics, to start a successful business online. “Actívate helped me launch my project and gave me the tools to make my clothes well-known in the ‘ocean’ of the Internet,” she says.

Since launching her online shop, Somos Océano, Ana hasn’t looked back. “I feel very proud of myself because I overcame my fears,” she says. “With the necessary will and knowledge, anyone can change their future.”

Google Actívate helps Borja grow his business from scratch

Borja Piedra, founder of Huerta Tropical

Borja’s passion for food started when he was just a young boy growing up in Asturias, but little did he know it would play such an important role in his life. After graduating with a degree in Marketing and Advertising, and working in uninspiring jobs, Borja found himself unemployed and unfulfilled. “I felt lost. I had no confidence in myself, and I lacked the skills to aspire to be what I really wanted to become.”

When a friend introduced Borja to the courses offered through Google Actívate, the future suddenly looked brighter. “When I found out about Actívate, I just knew I had to do something in the online world,” says Borja. “It didn’t just give me the tools I needed; it inspired me to move forward professionally and personally, to pursue my passion, to dare.”

Borja finished the courses determined to set up his own online business. Thanks to the skills he gained through Actívate, including SEO and search engine marketing, he launched his e-commerce site Huerta Tropical, which sells tropical fruit grown in Spain. “It has evolved from being just a project to becoming my life,” says Borja. “It’s the reason why I wake up in the morning and face all the fears I once had.”

Alex Valero, from unemployment to a business helping others find work

Álex Valero, founder of BuscoExtra

Alex Valero was working as a graphic designer in Zaragoza when suddenly and tragically, his father died. He quit his job and returned to his native Granada, to be near his mother, who was unwell. But finding a job proved difficult and he spent a year out of work.

In that time, he started hearing about the problems restaurant owners had finding staff and easily managing paperwork - and one day, when out for a bike ride, he had a brainwave. What about an app that would bring employers in hospitality together with people looking for jobs? The only problem was how to make it a reality. “I had the idea, but not the knowledge. That’s when I discovered Google Actívate.”

Through the free training with Google Actívate, Alex learnt everything he needed to get his new business up and running. “I learnt a lot from the courses - like how to start your company, understand your audience, create digital marketing campaigns and most importantly, how to turn users into clients.”

“BuscoExtra is what restaurants in Spain and Malaga need” says Juan, owner of El Gallo Ronco restaurant in Malaga. “Having this app fixes our problems and helps people find jobs.”

Now, from struggling with unemployment himself, Alex is proud that not only is the business going from strength to strength, but helping others find new jobs. “We’ve gone from a team of 4 to 12 - and now we’re hoping to take BuscoExtra across Spain and Europe. We are so proud to have helped people find work - all from an idea I had when riding my bike.”

Jimena Santalices, connect rural with urban through digital world

Jimena Santalices in Ancares

Jimena Santalices is a girl from a small town, Lugo in Galicia. Formerly, she studied journalism and has worked in communication, culture and fashion areas.

At some point of her life, she had the chance to live 6 months in Australia, which seeded her with the thought of changing her career path. Later on, she attended the Digital Marketing course and the training of entrepreneurship both delivered by Google Actívate. With the courses and trainings she received, an inspiration of starting a business related to where she is from was born. Jimena started her business in the hospitality industry with the goal of having more people knowing the beauty of Spain, of Galicia, and of Ancares. With the help of her digital skills on Google Adwords, she was able to introduce the charm of her town to a broader audience all across the world and to connect the rural experience to urban lifestyles. Currently 30% of her bookings are from countries such as England, Italy, Belgium, Netherlands, USA and France.

Women Will

Women Will is a Grow with Google program with presence in 48 countries. The main objective is to help women grow their skills, career and businesses. In Spain, the program is focused on 2 main pillars: Entrepreneurship and digital literacy.

1. Entrepreneurship workshops for +500 women in alliance with Google for Startups Campus Madrid. In the face to face trainings, participants can learn how to make a strategic plan, keys to develop and boost their businesses, apart from connecting with other women entrepreneurs.

2. “Digitalizadas”: Digital Literacy trainings for +8.000 rural women. Thanks to Google.org’s partnership with Fundación Mujeres and Fundación Cibervoluntarios, we provide digital skills training for rural women. They learn how to use technology, how to boost their businesses with a greater online presence or how to find a job thanks to the Internet. Launched with the Queen of Spain in March 2018, we have already trained 4.000 women in different rural towns all over the country. In 2020 we have announced the second grant from .Org to that NGO. The objective is to reach 8k women trained and create an online community of 500 “digitizers” that spread the message among their rural communities and help other women.

Paloma Rodríguez: “There is always time to learn new things. Technology is an infinite world”

Lorena García: “I have liked the workshop. It has been very interesting. I will continue practicing until I learn so that I dont forget it”

María Carmen Montaner: “I struggle learning, however I will keep trying”

I am Remarkable

#IamRemarkable is a Google initiative empowering women and underrepresented groups to celebrate their achievements in the workplace and beyond. Since the launch of the initiative in Spain in 2017, we have reached +1000 women in +50 workshops in collaboration with the United Nations, universities, companies, NGOs and women associations.

One of them was Más Mujeres Creativas.Born in 2016, Más Mujeres Creativas (MMC) is a collaborative platform that promotes visibility and equal opportunities for Spanish female creatives. Directed by Emma Pueyo, Belén Coca and Auxi Barea, MMC works as a network of more than 200 professionals and a launchpad of mentoring programmes, scholarships, inspiring talks and equality-promoting agreements with advertising festivals and entities.

MMC considered Google’s #IamRemarkable initiative, a great opportunity to support and revitalize the careers of senior female creatives. “We had noticed that professional growth slows down at this point of a female creative’s career and the promotion to a Creative Director role becomes unlikely – partly because of a lack of self-confidence.'' The experience was fulfilling and moving at equal parts. “It was a confidence boost for the women in the room. They felt much more remarkable than before the workshop and they thought the most revealing part was seeing how they judged themselves.

Google.org

(FAD receiving the grant award at the Brussels Online Safety Summit)

Google Impact Challenge for Safety

The Google.org Impact Challenge on Safety is a €10m fund to support organisations across Europe that are working on challenges related to hate, extremism, and child safety, both online and offline. By funding new and existing community projects across Europe, we hope to support initiatives to counter hate and extremism, and help young people to become confident digital citizens.

In the past February 2020, we announced the selected projects from the Google.org Impact Challenge on Safety. Each of these grantees receives funding between €50,000 and €1,000,000 and support from Google. Fundación de Ayuda contra la Drogadicción (FAD) and Vidas Cruzadas, both grantees for Spain, received +500K to work in projects that feature a component of skill-building in order to grow resilience and creative uses of digital as well as offline interventions.

Genios

Thanks to the partnership between Ayuda en Acción and Google.org we train kids and teens that are at risk of social exclusion in programming and coding, the 21st century language. With this programme we aim at democratizing access to technology, foster equality and reduce the socioeconomic barriers when it comes to skills for the future. We have trained more than 13.000 kids in 12 regions, half of them girls.

Google Public Policy Fellowship

José María Zavala

In 2019 Google launched for the first time in Spain its EMEA Public Policy Fellowship programme, which is available in 15 countries across Europe, Middle East and Africa.

The programme was first launched to offer post-graduate students and early-stage professionals with an interest in Internet and technology policy the opportunity to spend time contributing to the public dialogue on these issues, and exploring future academic and professional interests. In Spain we partnered with COTEC Foundation to explore the intersections of innovation policy and digital governance. The fellowship applicants had to write a proposal for a study that focused on how digital transformation can help to address and reduce digital gaps.

This is how José María Zavala became the first Spanish Public Policy fellow. From January to June 2019, he has been working on the creation of a tool to measure the different gaps that new technologies might create, and he hopes that his research can be useful for the industry and public sector alike. In his own words:

“It has been a very positive experience: I have had the opportunity to deepen my specialty and to investigate and learn in the field of social inequality and innovation. I have been able to approach new ways of conceiving digital transformation from social values, and highlight the importance of the impact of digitalization on social relations. Also, I have managed to identify some of the key aspects in the relationship between digitalization and inequality. My participation in the Google Public Policy Fellowship program has allowed me to deepen several interesting topics: circular economy, the future of work, the impact of robotization, attitudes towards innovation and keys to promoting inclusive innovation.”

Appendix: Calculating the total economic impact of Google

How can we estimate the total impact created by digital products and services like Google on the Spanish economy, society and standard of living?

Traditional economic impact studies have tended to focus on the impact of a company or product on Gross Domestic Product (GDP). GDP itself, however, has never included everything we value or every type of work we do. Taken literally, GDP takes no account of changes in our leisure time or the amount of work we do in non-market roles, such as housework or family care.

For the most part, this hasn’t mattered too much - there is reasonable evidence that GDP is highly correlated with other things that we care about, such as a clean environment or overall happiness. GDP might not measure all that mattered, but it made a reasonable stand-in.

If there is one thing that is striking about the digital economy to an economist, however, it is how much of it is open for anyone to access, with no pay wall. The world’s eight most popular websites - Google, YouTube, Facebook, Baidu, Wikipedia, Twitter, Instagram and Yahoo!³⁷ – are all offered without charge. As many estimates have calculated, the modern smartphone replaces what once would have been dozens of separate devices costing thousands of euros, including phone, camera, video camera, games console, alarm clock, map, satnav, book, television, DVD player, Walkman, stopwatch, torch, debit card, compact mirror, step tracker, portable speaker and compass.

At the same time, as we have explored throughout this paper, digital services are increasingly both saving us time in our non-market work - making it easier to do housework or DIY - and substituting for jobs that once we might have paid someone to do for us, such as booking a flight or holiday, and enabling new types of careers.

The combination of a lack of prices and the fact that many digital services are a completely new type of good - there is no real non digital equivalent to a search engine - makes it much more challenging for economists and statisticians to estimate how much they matter to consumers.

Nevertheless, economists have developed multiple methods that allow us to estimate how much value – or consumer surplus – is created by unpriced goods, which in this paper we have applied in turn to Google’s products, including:

Using time or attention as a proxy for the cost we are prepared to pay for digital goods. Money is not the only cost we have to pay to use a good or service – our time is valuable too. According to our poll, the average online Spanish estimates that they spend over an hour a day on their smartphone. This time carries a significant opportunity cost of everything else we could be doing either for leisure or our job – suggesting that we must find the digital service at least as valuable as the alternative.

Asking individuals to estimate the amount they would be hypothetically willing to pay for a service – or alternatively, what they would be willing to accept to give it up. For decades, economists and social scientists have experimented with the best way to ask individuals about their preferences over unpriced goods, such as a natural park or clean air. When designed right, these surveys can deliver surprisingly accurate results. In the future, the arrival of new mass online polling solutions such as Google Consumer Surveys and big data enabled by the internet could potentially allow us to significantly improve the accuracy, speed and reliability of our economic statistics – allowing us to better measure what as individuals we really care about.

Comparing preferences for a free good against another good which has a price attached. Finally, rather than try and construct a hypothetical price – something we rarely do in real life – we often find it easier to compare between different items: would people rather give up their washing machine or dishwasher? By comparing items with prices to those that are unpriced, we can produce a ranking, and bracket how valuable the free good must be.

While we have tried to directly estimate the time saved by Google services whenever possible, on other occasions we have had to rely on stated preferences, as has long been common practice in other areas where valuation is challenging, such as environmental economics. These estimates work by asking individuals whether they would be prepared to lose access to a particular product for varying amounts of money - and assuming that if they reject this deal, the service must be worth at least that amount. Other research has found that these kinds of estimates give a reasonably reliable estimate of the value created by digital services (see Box) - with survey respondents providing similar responses even when there is a real, non-hypothetical risk of losing access if they did not provide an accurate estimate.

As a sense check, we also asked our polling recipients to rank Search, YouTube and their smartphone against other consumer goods by which they would most want to avoid giving up - finding that, on average, internet connected Spaniards would rather lose access to public transport than their smartphone or a search engine.

Another question might be what we are measuring against: if Google didn’t exist, how would the world look different? Presumably another search engine would be the market leader - but how would its quality differ? Given the scale of the consumer surplus we found, an alternative only 10% worse would lead to significant reductions in consumer welfare. For the most part, in our polling we always asked those we surveyed the value of a specific Google product rather than a generic category - leaving them the hypothetical option to switch to a competitor even if they lost access to Google’s product. This makes our study different from many of the other studies that have been done on the value of digital products, and given the high values we found, suggest that many people significantly value Google’s services.

In total, our estimates suggest that a conservative estimate of the total consumer surplus created by Google services in Spain is €49 billion a year or around €544 per year for the median person. We believe this work supports the growing evidence in the literature that digital services are creating significant unmeasured value for ordinary findings. While our estimate is already a large number, other studies have found that the value of online search as a whole could be as high as $15,600 per person a year.³⁸

Other estimates of the consumer value created by the digital economy

Depending on their methodology and assumptions, the estimates of the value produced by the online economy can vary by many orders of magnitude. In general, however, even the more modest estimates find that online services are creating significant surplus value beyond what their users directly pay.

Goolsbee and Klenow’s paper Valuing Consumer Products by the Time Spent Using Them: An Application to the Internet (2006) uses the opportunity cost of the leisure time spent on the Internet to estimate a total consumer surplus equivalent to $3,000 on average in the US.

McKinsey’s report The Web’s €100 billion surplus (2011)³⁹ used stated preference methods to calculate the total consumer surplus created by online services, netting off consumers preference to avoid advertising or sharing their data. Their estimates found that search created a monthly consumer surplus equivalent to €3.1, for email €3.2, maps €1.1 and video €0.9.

Brynjolfsson and Oh’s paper The Attention Economy: Measuring the Value of Free Digital Services on the Internet (2012)⁴⁰ updated the methodology of Goolsbee and Klenow (2006) to account for that the Internet might simply be substituting for watching TV, finding that free online sites create the equivalent of around $500 per person in consumer surplus. Brynjolfsson, Eggers and Gannameni’s paper Using Massive Online Choice Experiments to Measure Changes in Well-Being (2017) used online surveys to test both willingness to accept compensation in place of digital goods and to create a ranking of different goods. They find significantly higher numbers, with a consumer surplus for search the equivalent of $17,500 a year, for email $8,400, maps $3,600 and video $1,170. In order to test the reliability of these hypothetical numbers, they run a smaller scale experiment where they actually make some people go through with giving up the online service – and find this creates little change in valuation. In addition, they run a ranking experiment, and find that giving up search engines, email and smartphones are all ranked somewhere between the equivalent of losing $500 to $1000 a year.

Methodology

As described in the main report, accurately estimating the value created by digital products is extremely challenging – and this is particularly true for products that are offered without monetary charge, are used widely across the economy, and contain elements of both consumption and production, as is true for many Google products.

While we believe our estimates are based on conservative assumptions, it is worth being aware of their limitations:

Many of our estimates are based on the gross impact of Google’s products, as it is hard to accurately quantify what a counterfactual world without Google would look like.
Conversely, in some cases we have not been able to fully quantify all the impacts created by Google products, suggesting that our estimates should be viewed as a lower bound.
Many of our estimates make use of new polling carried out for this report – but as in any poll, consumers may underestimate or overestimate their use of products. (Full polling tables for data used in this report are available in an online appendix.)
Best practice in many of these areas, such as valuing an hour of leisure time or using stated preferences to calculate consumer surplus, remains an area of active academic debate.
Google did not provide any new or internal data to generate these estimates. All our modelling is based on third-party or public data, alongside our own internal estimates.

Consumer Benefits

Google Search

Our headline estimate of the total consumer surplus of Google Search is calculated as the geometric average of:

Time saved. Following the methodology of Varian (2011), we assume that using Google saves 15 minutes per question, with the average person asking 1 answerable question every 2 days. Time saved is valued at the self-reported polling data of average incomes, and we scale the overall estimate by third party estimates of Internet prevalence and polling information on Google Search usage. (More information on this overall approach can be found in the Economic Value of Google, a presentation by Google Chief Economist Hal Varian.)

Stated preference (Willingness to Accept). As part of our polling, we asked participants a single discrete binary choice question of “Would you prefer to keep access to Google Search or go without access to Google Search for one month and get paid [Price]” with the price offered randomised between €1.25, €2.5, €5, €10, €20, €50, €100, €200 and €500. We linearly regressed the results of this poll to derive a demand curve and used this to calculate total consumer surplus per user. Finally, we scaled this estimate by third party estimates of Internet prevalence and polling information on Google Search usage.

Following Brynjolfsson et al (2017), we chose a Willingness to Accept (WTA) rather than Willingness to Pay format for our Stated Preference question as we believed this best matched the status quo, given that the majority of Google Services are provided without charge to the end user and require no up-front investment.

As with many other products, the mean consumer surplus is significantly higher than the median – or, in other words, a few dedicated users use it disproportionately more than the average.

In order to ensure that our household level figures were not misleading, we based them not on the mean household value for WTA compensation, but instead a separate estimate of the median WTA. We derived this by regressing our polling data again, using an exponential method which we judged was more likely to accurately represent the bottom of the distribution.

Google Maps

Our headline estimate of the total consumer surplus of Google Maps is calculated as the geometric average of:

Time saved. We calculate time saved by Google Maps, using estimates of time saved by advanced traveler information systems from Levinson (2003) and total time spent travelling by mode from our polling, calibrated by Spanish Labour Force Survey data on the total time spent commuting. Time saved is valued at 37.5% of the estimated hourly income of Google Maps users, following standard practice for calculating the value of travel time savings.
Stated preference. As with Google Search, we asked the participants of our poll a single discrete binary choice question of “Would you prefer to keep access to Google Maps or go without access to Google Maps for one month and get paid [Price]” with the price offered randomised between €1.25, €2.5, €5, €10, €20, €50, €100, €200 and €500. We linearly regressed the results of this poll to derive a demand curve and used this to calculate total consumer surplus per user. Finally, we scaled this estimate by third party estimates of Internet prevalence and polling information on usage.
In Google Maps usage. In addition, we constructed a separate estimate of the median WTA compensation for losing Google Maps which we used for our per person and household estimates.

YouTube

Our headline estimate of the total consumer surplus of Google Search is calculated as the geometric average of:

Time saved. Extrapolating from the methodology Varian (2011), we assume that using YouTube saves 11 minutes per question, using self-reporting polling data to calibrate the number of questions asked. Time saved is valued at the self-reported polling data of average incomes, and we scale the overall estimate by third party estimates of Internet prevalence and polling information on YouTube usage.

Stated preference (Willingness to Accept). As part of our polling, we asked participants a single discrete binary choice question of “Would you prefer to keep access to YouTube or go without access to YouTubeGoogle Search for one month and get paid [Price]” with the price offered randomised between€1.25, €2.5, €5, €10, €20, €50, €100, €200 and €500. We linearly regressed the results of this poll to derive a demand curve and used this to calculate total consumer surplus per user. Finally, we scaled this estimate by third party estimates of Internet prevalence and polling information on YouTubeGoogle Search usage.

Gmail and Google Docs

Given that we had no time saving estimates for these products, we instead relied on estimates drawn again from stated preferences, following the same procedure. We asked the participants of our poll a single discrete binary choice question “Would you prefer to keep access to [Gmail / Google Docs] or go without access to [Gmail / Google Docs] for one month and get paid [Price]” with the price offered randomised between €1.25, €2.5, €5, €10, €20, €50, €100, €200 and €500. We linearly regressed the results of this poll to derive a demand curve and used this to calculate total consumer surplus per user. Finally, we scaled these estimates by third party estimates of Internet prevalence and polling information on each product’s usage. In addition, we constructed a separate estimate of the median WTA compensation for each product which we used for quoted per person and household estimates.

Android

In addition to measuring the consumer surplus individuals received for individual Google services, we also investigated the overall consumer surplus Spaniards receive from their smartphone.

We asked the participants of our poll a single discrete binary choice question “Would you prefer to keep access to your smartphone or go without access to your smartphone for one month and get paid [Price]” with the price offered randomised between €1.25, €2.5, €5, €10, €20, €50, €100, €200 and €500.

We then scaled this number by Android’s market share in Spain and Lee (2016)’s estimate of the proportion of net smartphone consumer surplus, excluding substitution value.

Given the overlap with individual services - one reason we value our phone is because it allows us to access Search, Maps, Gmail or YouTube - and the challenges in decomposing the value attributable to software and hardware, we did not include this estimate in our number for the overall value created by Google in Spain.

Business Benefits

Google Ads

Following the precedent of past Google impact reports, we use third-party data to estimate the total size of the Spanish Google Ads market, combining PWC Global Entertainment & Media Outlook data on the total Spanish paid search market with other estimates of Google’s market share.

Following the methodology of the US Google Economic Impact Report, we then scale this revenue by an assumed Return on Investment (ROI) factor of 8, from:

Varian (2009) estimates that businesses make on average $2 for every $1 they spend of AdWords.
Jansen and Spink (2009) estimate that businesses receive 5 clicks on their search results for every 1 click on their ads.
Google estimates that search clicks are about 70% as valuable as ad clicks.
Total ROI is then 2 * spend + 70% * 5 * 2 * spend – spend = 8 (spend).

More information on this methodology is available at economicimpact.google.com/methodology/

AdSense

In order to estimate total Spanish Adsense revenues, we scale Google’s 2019 global Traffic Acquisition Costs to network members by Spain’s share of global display spending, derived from PWC Global Entertainment & Media Outlook data. In addition, we also include the estimated returns to advertisers, drawing on the estimated ROI of display advertising from Kireyev et al (2013).

YouTube

In order to estimate total Spanish revenues to Spanish creators, we combine:

Google’s reported global YouTube advertising revenue in 2019
PWC Global Entertainment & Media Outlook data on total Spanish video advertising revenue as a share of the global total
Sandvine data on YouTube’s 2017 share of EMEA video bandwidth
AdStage data on YouTube CPC and CTRs

We then further scale this by an assumed conservative ROI factor.

Android

We scale App Annie 2019 data on worldwide Android app store consumer spend and Android revenue share by Caribou Digital (2016)’s estimate of the Spanish share of total app store value captured, and a 70% revenue share for the developers. We then scale this by the ratio between app store revenue and total revenue, including consultancy work, derived from Card and Mulligan (2014).

AI (Inteligencia Artificial)

We draw on McKinsey Global Institute (2017) estimates of the proportion of automatable jobs in Spain, and conservatively assume that combined software and hardware costs for automated task converge to 10% of the cost of human labour. Next, we assume that automation takes place over 50 years, following a logistic S-curve, with Spanish state of adoption proxied by its current lag in internet adoption with the US.

In order to estimate the potential impact on administrative tasks, we draw on polling data on average time spent on administrative work.

Internet Trends 2019, Mary Meeker, Bond
Author calculation derived from https://www.seagate.com/files/www-content/our-story/trends/files/idc-seagate-dataage-whitepaper.pdf
Number of SKUs at a standard supermarket from https://www.fmi.org/our-research/supermarket-facts; number of SKUs from an online retailer from https://www.scrapehero.com/number-of-products-on-amazon-april-2019/; YouTube uploads from https://www.statista.com/statistics/259477/hours-of-video-uploaded-to-youtube-every-minute/
Consumer Surplus in the Digital Economy: Estimating the Value of Increased Product Variety at Online Booksellers, Erik Brynjolfsson, Yu (Jeffrey) Hu, Michael D. Smith, 2003
http://observatorioadei.es/publicaciones/valor_internet_final_nov19.pdf
Including Google Economic Impact (US, 2019, Google), Google’s Impact in the UK: At Home, At School At Work (UK, 2018, Public First), Google’s Economic Impact (Canada, 2018, Deloitte),Google Economic and Social Impact (New Zealand, 2017, AlphaBeta), Google Economic and Social Impact (Australia, 2015, AlphaBeta) and Google’s Economic Impact: United Kingdom (UK, 2014, Deloitte)
For our full methodology, see the appendix at the end of this report
World Travel and Tourism Council. (29 de agosto de 2019). Travel & Tourism becomes the largest contributor to Spanish economy, says new WTTC Benchmarking research.
https://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?DataSetCode=ANHRS#
Economic Value of Google, Hal Varian
Unless stated otherwise, we use ‘regularly’ in this report to refer to an action taken at least once a month.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/20865386?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents https://pdfs.semanticscholar. org/7dab/41504f61a8f85fc83c26e6700aad34a251c5.pdf 2
https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/data/youtube-viewership-statistics/
Statcounter. (2020, Marzo). Mobile Operate System Market Share Spain.
World Bank. 2009. World Development Report 2009 : Reshaping Economic Geography. World Bank.
Using Massive Online Choice Experiments to Measure Changes in Well-Being, Brynjolfsson, Eggers and Gannameni, 2017
https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-biggest-industries-in-spain.html
Some of this value overlaps with the consumer surplus from Google’s other core products such as Search or YouTube. As such, we have not included it in the total value.
Observatorio Adei, Google. (November 2019). El valor de internet.
Brynjolfssson, E. & Oh, J.H. (2012), The Attention Economy: Measuring the Value of Free Digital Services on the Internet, Thirty Third International Conference on Information Systems
https://economicimpact.google.com/methodology/
For our full methodology, see the appendix at the end of this report
See, for example here or here.
Splangler, T. (May, 2019). YouTube Now Has 2 Billion Monthly Users, Who Watch 250 Million Hours on TV Screens Daily, Variety, https://variety.com/2019/digital/news/youtube-2-billion-users-tv-screen-watch-time-hours-1203204267/,

YouTube About. YouTube para prensa. https://www.youtube.com/yt/about/press/,

and Statista, (May, 2019). Hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute as of May 2019 https://www.statista.com/statistics/259477/hours-of-video-uploaded-to-youtube-every-minute/
https://evansdata.com/press/viewRelease.php?pressID=244
Caribou Digital Report
https://www.statista.com/statistics/266210/number-of-available-applications-in-the-google-play-store/
Sensor Tower. (January, 2019). Store Intelligence Data Digest Q4 and Full Year 2018, Sensor Tower.
App Annie. (2020). The State of Mobile 2019.
Mandel, M., Long, E. (October, 2017). The App Economy in Europe: Leading Countries and Cities, Progressive Policy Institute
The Total Economic Impact of Google Apps for Work, Forrester Consulting, 2015
Eurostat. (December, 2018). Cloud computing - statistics on the use by enterprises.
Public First calculation based on: Deloitte, (September 2018), Economic and social impacts of Google Cloud
Assuming half of Spanish workers use Google Search on a weekly basis, and 20% of workers use G Suite. Based upon work by Forrester Consulting, we assume each user of G Suite saves between 15 minutes and 2 hours each a week. We conservatively assume that workers research one question through Google Search a week, and that this saves them 15 minutes. Total time saved is converted into a monetary amount using Spanish average output per hour.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyRPyRKHO8M&feature=youtu.be
European Commission. (2019). Shaping Europe’s digital future.
Amstrong, M. (November, 2019), The World's Most Popular Websites, Statista.
Brynjolfsson, E., Eggers, F. & Gannameni, A. (2017). Using Massive Online Choice Experiments to Measure Changes in Well-Being.
The Web’s €100 billion surplus, McKinsey, 2011
Brynjolfsson, E. & Oh, J. H. (2012). The Attention Economy: Measuring the Value of Free Digital Services on the Internet. Thirty Third International Conference on Information Systems.

Economy

Helping Consumers

Business & Innovation

Workers & Productivity

12 ways that Google helped and supported Spaniards in their everyday lives in 2019

Google supports the economic and sustainable growth of Spain

Google creates products that are helpful and valued by everyone

Google helps businesses grow and innovate

Google helps workers be more productive, learn new skills and develop their careers

Introduction - Google’s impact in Spain

The internet has created an era of unprecedented consumer and business choice

Google helps people get things done, and grows the economy

Much of the value created by Google is not included in traditional economic statistics

How we quantified Google’s impact in Spain

Google supports the economic growth of Spain

The value of Google products in the economy

How Google supports growth

The economic impact of Google

Google Search and Ads Economic Impact in Spain (bn)

Google contribution to GVA by region

Importance of online search for companies in Spain by number of employees

Importance of online search for companies in Spain by sector

Google creates products that are helpful and valued by everyone

Google makes everyday life easier, freeing up valuable time

The importance of extra time

Saving time with Google Search and Google Assistant

Speed

Coverage

Convenience

Google Assistant

Saving time with Google Maps

Percentage using Google Maps to...

Google is being used by people of all ages to learn new skills

Google helps people learn

Google Scholar: access to the world’s best research

Google’s Education Programmes

Most popular uses for Google Search in Spain (size=popularity)

Google Arts and Culture

Helping teen Spaniards become savvy news consumers through Infórmate

YouTube uses: popularity and frequency

Fighting hate and intolerance online through Somos más

Keeping in touch with friends and family

Google products are used near equally by people of all incomes, ages, and backgrounds

Use of Google products by income (1 = national average)

Use of Google products by age (1 = national average)

The value of Google products in daily life

Consumer Surplus (bn)

Google helps businesses grow and innovate

The referral traffic driven by Google is a highly valuable source of revenue for Spanish businesses

Google Ad Grants

Google Search and Ads have made it much easier for local and international customers to find Spanish companies

Helping businesses export

Google Market Finder

Google My Business

Think with Google

Helping local customers find businesses

Google is helping create a more consumer centric Spanish economy

By increasing consumer transparency, Google is helping drive better customer service

Helping small businesses compete and grow

Google makes it easier for new companies to compete with established firms

Google for Startups

Google for Startups: Growth Academy

Google’s products are enabling entirely new types of business, such as YouTube Creators

YouTube Creators

YouTube initiatives in Spain

The economic impact of Android development

Mobile App Launchpad and Google Developer Training

Publishers

Google News Initiative

Google helps workers be more productive, learn new skills and develop their careers

Google helps workers be more productive

Usage of internet technologies over time

Google Cloud

Protecting businesses online with cutting-edge security

Investing in cybersecurity in Spain

Google helps people get more done while on the go

Looking up information

Managing Work

Kept on schedule

Google is helping workers upskill and find new jobs

Business &
Innovation

Workers &
Productivity