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The flotation has also come to prominence thanks to its unconventional structure and the summer slowdown in the financial markets, as well as concerns over growth in the paid-for search sector. Yet, if it does go ahead, it will also raise questions about users' perception of the brand.

Concerns that Google - until now heralded as the people's champion - may suffer by being seen to 'sell-out' exist, although many feel that has already begun.

"Perceptions of Google have been changing for some time anyway," says Roifield Brown, founder of local news and information web site MyVillage.com. "When it started to serve ads on the side, this diluted its image. The IPO is a further signpost for what is already happening."

However, this is a critical and pivotal time in which Google's next movements will determine its position in an increasingly competitive market. Google's image depends on what it does next. However, according to lastminute.com, which floated on the cusp of the dotcom crash in 2000 and suffered criticism in the process, brand impact will be minimal.

A spokesperson for the late deals service explains: "Google is floating when the internet is now part of our everyday lives and it is already a brand leader in its field. I would be surprised if this had any direct impact on its brand appeal for the public at large."

The mantra 'all publicity is good publicity' may also apply. Although lastminute.com's IPO came under fire as the market crashed, the company believes that, long-term, this helped haul it through the dotcom bust.

The spokesperson adds: "The publicity around our IPO was very useful from a brand awareness perspective."

Nigel Markwick, senior consultant at brand consultants Wolff Olins, reckons: "Floating will not influence public perception as long as Google continues with what it started, which is to make it easy for people to find information on the internet."

The key question to be answered is whether Google merely wants to develop the best, unbeatable search technology or become a portal and improve on Yahoo! and MSN's offerings?

Google has added a number of new services, such as local search, Froogle, Gmail and the recently acquired Picasa, which organises digital photos on the desktop. And its in-house labs are swimming with more ideas.

Shakil Khan, Google adwords moderator on the independent resource for webmasters webmasterworld.com, thinks that Google will move into an instant messenger-type service, which may have an impact on users and advertisers. "It will be a solid contender for Bill Gates and Microsoft," he suggests.

However, from a user point of view, Khan believes there is unlikely to be a negative effect on perception: "Google is a very solid and consumer-orientated brand - there are so many people who use Google on a daily basis." This would make it the perfect spawning ground for a service such as instant messenger, he notes.

"But there is likely to be an impact in the b2b market as Google expands into new areas. The search engine is now competing against advertisers who previously built their brands through the search engine," Khan adds.

He feels the biggest impact on perception of the brand may arrive with investor demands. "Google has so much data at its fingertips - it holds information on people's search patterns and profiles globally. Once Google goes public, will it try to monetise every last bit of information it holds? Will investors want to sell this information?"

In addition, by not stating its intentions clearly, Google runs the risk of smudging perception of it as a strong brand among shareholders, advertisers and the public. "Google needs to spell out a clear strategy of how it will move forward. What sort of business is this going to be in the future?" asks Markwick.

There may be implications for advertisers as well, according to MyVillage's Brown. He says the shareholders will want dividends on their investment - and this might put pressure on Google to change its format to appeal to evolving advertising demands online.

"Large, sexy brands want to use the internet for direct response, which Google is good at. But, to build and consolidate a brand, this kind of advertising isn't applicable - search engines like Google will have to change their white-background black-type format," says Brown.

He adds: "Publishers have an advertising advantage over Google. They offer more opportunities for branding and, as sure as eggs are eggs, Google's shareholders are going to want some of the same."

But user perception is more of a threat. Markwick asks: "How does it make sure that the Google brand isn't just related to its technology, which could be out of date within a couple of months? Google needs to build on user communications if it is to go from just a technology to a provider of a range of services.

"Google runs the risk of becoming a generic term for search if it doesn't clarify its position," he continues. "There is no integrating idea pulling together all of Google's ideas, other than search. It needs to set out its core values of being simple, direct and easy to use."

He adds: "If we are looking at a technology brand, it is hard to stay ahead. Technology as a commodity moves rapidly and is easily replicated. Google must offer users something more. Currently, it is experimenting in different areas, but it is difficult to see the core idea behind them. If it doesn't clarify that, it is difficult to see what the future holds."

GOOGLE'S SHARE OFFERING

Google looked to auction 24.6 million shares online for an estimated $108 (£59) to $135 (£73) per share, which will value the entire company at $29 billion (£15.9bn) to $36bn (£19.8bn). At this valuation, Google would be worth more than Sony or McDonald's.

Underwriters Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse First Boston Corp are in charge of conducting an auction to determine the IPO price; a method that Google acknowledges is unconventional in the US. The auction will consist of five stages: qualification; bidding; auction closing; pricing and allocation.

Google has launched a site for the IPO, ipo.google.com, with a five-day registration period, followed by bids over 10 business days to determine the offering price. The customary period for an IPO is 180 days. Trading will take place two to three weeks after.

Only 'US persons' - defined as US residents, trusts, corporations or partnerships, among other technical, legal definitions - can register to bid.

GOOGLE'S BRAND STRETCHING

Google has several new services accessed through its home page or Beta Labs, which are giving it a portal flavour. These include:

Answers Some 500 researchers answer questions on a pay-per-query basis, accessed via the home page, usually within 24 hours.

Blogger.com Google bought Pyra Labs, the San Francisco-based firm that created technology for writing online journals known as weblogs (blogs) in February 2003 for an undisclosed sum. Blogger.com is accessible from the homepage.

Froogle The shopping-comparison service moved from Google's Beta labs to its home page in March 2004 but remains a beta service. It gets listings for products from merchants and the web. When Google spiders over a page that seems to sell something, it feeds the data to Froogle. Merchants don't pay for their products to appear in search results but can buy sponsored links.

GMail The free web-based email service launched in April 2004 with one gigabyte of storage. Google only offers it as part of a preview release and limited test. Gmail's backbone is the Google search engine, which lets users find emails by searching their past conversations. There are no pop-ups, but the brand places contextual text ads and links to related pages adjacent to users' messages by spidering content. This has caused privacy concerns.

Google News Users can search 4,500 news services and sign up for alerts on topics from the beta site.

Google groups Accessible from the home page, users can search articles from news groups dating back to 1981.

Google Zeitgeist Lists, graphs and data on its users' search behaviour.

Images Google acquired Picasa, which lets users organise digital images on desktops, in July 2004. In May 2004, Picasa announced a technology partnership with Google's Blogger service, making it easier to publish digital photos with Blogger. Google's Image Search, run from the home page, has some 880 million indexed images.

Web directory Integrates Google's search facility with Open Directory pages, accessed from the home page.