For the second time in as many months Google has run an advert on its homepage. The ad reads “Dream big, get things done and change the world. Introducing Google for Entrepreneurs” and is an advert for a suite of tools, all by Google, that are designed to help entrepreneurs. The advert is purely text and appears below the search button.

Last month Google had an advert for its Nexus 7 tablet. That ad had an image of the top part of the Nexus 7 tablet showing and when you clicked on it you were taken through to the Google Play store where you were able to purchase one of the new tablets.

These are not the first times that Google has advertised on its homepage. The search engine giant first did that back in 2009 and has mainly used homepage ads to promote Android phones. What is very unusual is to have two homepage ads running so close together. This may signal a future change in strategy with Google promoting its own products on the homepage. I have no doubt that the engineers at Google will be monitoring the click through rates of their ads very closely to work out what type of ad is most effective for them.

I suppose the big question is “Will Google one day allow third party ads on their homepage?” This would potentially be a gold mine for Google and I am sure that only the largest international brands would be able to afford to place an ad on what is widely regarded as the most visited webpage in the world.

So what format of ads would Google be likely to allow? The Google homepage is renowned for its clean and simple look would it be possible to incorporate a banner ad somewhere on the page? Would a banner ad be acceptable. If it was just a text ad would it gain the click through rate that an advertiser would expect for advertising on what would surely be one of the most expensive pieces of web real estate? On the other hand Google may reserve the home page to push Google related products.

The ad is running on the google.com and google.co.uk websites. It is not on French, Spanish or Polish Google. German Google has a different ad, one for protecting your family online, no doubt due to the huge online privacy concerns that exist in Germany.

As I have already said, Google will be studying the click through rates of all their ads and no doubt the number of conversions or successful goals that those that click achieve. There is one thing for sure, if there is anybody best placed to analyse what is effectively a pay per click campaign then it is surely Google!