Googleforce news fizzles, not sizzles

The big news everyone expected coming out of the hush-hush Salesforce.com/talks was slightly underwhelming.

Instead of a grandiose mega-collaboration between Salesforce.com Inc. and Google Inc. to take down Microsoft Corp., the agreement was reduced to an arrangement whereby Salesforce.com’s 32,300 customers can distribute online ads through Google.

While future deals may be forthcoming or Salesforce.com is simply happy to lie back awhile and chip away at potential Microsoft customers, Salesforce.com CEO Benioff continues to believe that his company and Google “We have a shared vision that the Internet is the new computing platform.”

As for promotion, Google is offering Salesforce.com customers $50 in advertising credit. Salesforce.com is currently promoting a deal wherein subscribers pay just $600 for every five users annually, down from $995 per five users annually.

As rumors of the reduced story began to break on yesterday, Salesforce.com shares shed 82 cents to $47.06. Google shares gained $6.67 Monday to hit $507.07.