Marissa Mayer Approach - Launch Products Early and Often

Excerpted from Marketing Power Plays.

Since joining Google, Marissa Mayer has emerged as a powerful force inside the high-flying company. Her title, director of consumer Web products, belies her power and influence as a champion of innovation. Mayer has her hands on virtually everything the average Google user sees from the look of its Web pages to new software for searching your hard drive. And she helps decide which new initiatives get the attention of the company’s founders and which don’t.

What Mayer thinks will be essential for continued innovation is for Google to keep its sense of fearlessness. “I like to launch [products] early and often. That has become my mantra,” she says. She mentions Apple Computer and Madonna. “Nobody remembers the Sex Book or the Newton. Consumers remember your average over time. That philosophy frees you from fear.”