That is the question many investors and analysts are asking after Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) missed its second-quarter earnings estimates by a mere $0.03. Google's shares dropped 7% on the news, and of course the rumors started flying.

It seems to me the concern is misplaced. Google's sales came in at $3.87 billion, which is 58% higher than they were a year ago. The stock price is up 20% on the year. Profits may have been down a bit, but that's a natural result of the kind of growth that Google has been pursuing. This is a company that will continue to grow as online advertising revenues grow, through its acquisition of DoubleClick, and through the management's continuing efforts to find new markets. I believe its profits will return over the long term. The company clearly suffers from high expectations, and that, more than anything, drove the small panic over the earnings report. For many investors, the dip in the share price will be a way to get in at a 7% discount.

I'm not the only one who feels this way. Lehman Brothers issued a report on July 13 predicting the share price would hit $610 in the next year. The report based this, in part, on overly optimistic expectations for earnings for the second quarter, but the prediction did factor in the higher operating expenses that helped cause Google to miss its earnings forecast. In other words, this latest report from Google shouldn't have been the shock it was given that analysts knew some of the costs of growth would come home to roost in the short term.