Google makes heavy cuts to marketing budgets, begins hiring freezes

Tech giant Google is cutting its marketing budgets for the second half of the year, while implementing hiring freezes amid the coronavirus pandemic.

“There are budget cuts and hiring freezes happening across marketing and across Google,” a company global director told employees on Wednesday, according to CNBC. “We, along with the rest of marketing, have been asked to cut our budget by about half for H2.”

A Google spokesperson confirmed the budget cuts to The Hill in an email, saying, “we are re-evaluating the pace of our investment plans for the remainder of 2020 and will focus on a select number of important marketing efforts. We continue to have a robust marketing budget, particularly in digital, in many business areas.”

Following the news of the cuts, Google’s stocks fell almost 2 percent.

Last week, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai told employees of the hiring freeze for full-time and contract employees, CNBC reported.

“Beyond hiring, we continue to invest, but will be recalibrating the focus and pace of our investments in areas like data centers and machines, and nonbusiness essential marketing and travel,” he said in a note to employees. 

The spokesperson added, “We’ll be slowing down the pace of hiring, while maintaining momentum in a small number of strategic areas, and onboarding the many people who’ve been hired but haven’t started yet.”

–Updated at 11:02 a.m.