SES Chicago - December 7-11, 2009

October 29, 2008

SEW Experts: Search Trademark Hobby Kit

Who owns the trademark when it comes to search? A lot of angry litigation stems from the huge dollars that big brands measure from clicks on their trademarked terms in search results. In today's Searching for Meaning column, "Search Trademark Hobby Kit," Kevin Ryan asks if they're simply misunderstanding the search realm and buying funnel?

» Full story

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

January 11, 2008

Is the AdWords Competitor-bidding Party Over?

1-800-Contacts is trying to force a legal ruling that could put a chill on the widespread practice of PPC advertisers bidding on competitors' trademarks.

According to this article in MediaPost:

IN THE LATEST EXAMPLE OF a marketer suing about search ads, 1-800-Contacts this week filed a lawsuit in federal court against LensWorld for purchasing search links triggered by the term "1-800-contacts." The company, which has brought several other similar cases, says it's trying to guard against confusion. "The worry that they have is that these advertising methods will make consumers think there's an affiliation between these other companies and our client," said 1-800-Contacts' lawyer, Bryan G. Pratt.

Many advertisers experience great conversion results bidding on competitor terms, so the impact on the search advertising community as a whole could be huge.

Posted by David Szetela at 8:17 AM | Permalink

October 11, 2006

Google's "False & Deceptive" Search Ads

Ben Edelman's False and Deceptive Pay-Per-Click Ads analysis looks at specific ads on Google.com that seem to violate Google's editorial guidelines and perhaps US laws over "free" services being offered.

Edelman reviews ads that use the words "free" or make other claims that are said to be false.

He looks at "charging for software that's actually free" here, then he looks at "the "completely free" ringtones that aren't" here, and then reviews some "ads impersonating famous and well-known sites" here.

Finally, Edelman reviews the law, ethics, and incentives Google is faced with specific to these ads. He views Google and the search companies as the ones that really profit from such ads and suggests that Google "expand the policy to prevent these scams."

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:55 AM | Permalink

September 28, 2006

Fun and Profit with Search Ad Arbitrage

Clever (some would say evil) search advertisers are taking advantage of price differences in search advertising programs by buying comparatively inexpensive paid links in search results that drive users to pages with contextual ads with higher payoffs. While this search arbitrage is profitable for those who do it properly, it also aggravates other advertisers who complain that it drives costs up. And searchers aren't always happy with the practice either. The subject of search arbitrage was the focus of a lively debate at a recent SES panel, and guest writer Cat Seda covered the fireworks in today's SearchDay article, Search Arbitrage: Good or Evil? .

Posted by Chris Sherman at 2:53 AM | Permalink

June 8, 2006

Lawsuit Over Killed Anti-China Ad On Google

Google Sued for Allegedly Refusing Anti-China Ad at Wired News covers a lawsuit filed against Google after it refused to carry ads from activist Christopher Langdon protesting against the Chinese government.

You'll find the lawsuit here. I skimmed it very, very quickly. The key part is this:

Google's rejection of all three of my ads denied my rights of free speech and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

In other words, Langdon is claiming constructional protection to say what he wants on Google. It's not going to happen. Google has no requirement to print what he wants or carry his ads any more than a newspaper might. The public forum/public property argument he makes won't hold up, I'd say.

The courts will decide, of course. I suspect he'll lose, but it will certainly focus renewed attention on Google's ad policies that he dislikes.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:19 AM | Permalink

May 12, 2006

5% Of Search Results Lead To "Dangerous Sites"

Andy Beal reports on a Wall Street Journal article that claims 9% of paid search ads lead to "dangerous sites." Three-percent of organic results lead to risky sites, in comparison to the PPC ads. So on average, the article shows that "roughly 5% of the search results on average were risky sites." The SiteAdvisor study estimates a searcher will click to an "unsafe site from a search engine once every 15 days." Risky sites are defined as sites that can "infect consumers' personal computers or expose them to nuisances such as spam email."

Postscript by Detlev Johnson: You can find additional information at BBC with respect to natural listings that lead to risky sites. As much as 4-6% of search results in natural listings are categorized as risky, while sites in the sponsored listings can be 2-4 times as numerous.

The sheer volume of clicks this can account for is scary - 285 million per month. Search engines are known to try limiting their users from accessing risky sites through their search engines; at least as much as they combat spam. Their efforts will need to continue and be ongoing similarly to fighting search engine spam.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:16 AM | Permalink

February 23, 2006

Yahoo To Ban Bidding On Competitor Trademarks To Stop Comparison Advertising

Yahoo No Longer Allow Bidding On Trademarked Terms on our SEW Forums has news that Yahoo will no longer be allowing companies to purchase ads linked to the trademarks of their competitors. From what's being sent to advertisers:

On March 1, 2006, Yahoo! Search Marketing will modify its editorial guidelines regarding the use of keywords containing trademarks. Previously, we allowed competitive advertising by allowing advertisers to bid on third-party trademarks if those advertisers offered detailed comparative information about the trademark owner's products or services in comparison to the competitive products and services that were offered or promoted on the advertiser's site.

In order to more easily deliver quality user experiences when users search on terms that are trademarks, Yahoo! Search Marketing has determined that we will no longer allow bidding on keywords containing competitor trademarks.

OK, I haven't had a chance to talk with Yahoo yet, but here are few key points from what I see so far:

  • The policy doesn't seem to completely ban bidding on terms that are also trademarks, which is good. I won't spin out all the long explanations about why that is good, as I've done in the past. The short answer is that some products and services simply cannot be adequately advertised if you can't bid on a term that also is a trademark. Try selling "used ipods" if you can't buy the term "ipod," for example. Or look at the trouble this person is having about helping to advertise Ferrari driving experiences without being able to buy ads linked to that term on Google in Europe.  
  • In the US (where the Yahoo policy is coming into effect), the courts have so far upheld the right to link ads to terms that might also be trademarks. That's why Google allows you to buy ads linked to these terms in the US. You simply cannot use the terms in your ads. In Europe, you can't use the terms as trigger words or in copy. Google's full policy is here.  
  • Betcha I know what's prompted the move. Yahoo has been doing more and more work to attract big brand advertisers to link non-search campaigns back to search. The problem is, that means other competing brands can capitalize on this traffic. Mazda Taps Into Pontiac TV & Search Ads Again covers more about this. An easy way to stop your big brand advertisers you've partnered with from being walked over this way is to ban "comparison" ads linked to their campaigns.

Need more history on search ads and trademark disputes? The Legal: Trademarks section of the Search Topics area available to Search Engine Watch members has lots and lots of information.

Want to comment or discuss? Visit our SEW Forum thread, Yahoo No Longer Allow Bidding On Trademarked Terms.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 1:06 PM | Permalink

January 23, 2006

How to Handle Yahoo's Shorter Ad Descriptions

Last week, shorter ads descriptions came to Yahoo as Danny points out in this post. To assist with the change, Kevin Lee's column on the Clickz site: Strategies for Yahoo's Shorter Descriptions, offers some suggestions and tactics for SEM's on how to handle the new ad lengths.

Here are a few key points, in my view, from Kevin's column:

+ Don't simply clone your Google ads to Yahoo. Why? Any changes result in the ads going back through Yahoo!'s dreaded editorial process. So first, evaluate if the truncated ads continue to communicate your advertising message appropriately. Many advertisers write their descriptions in an inverted pyramid format, so truncation may not be a big deal because the meat of the message is in the first few words.

+ Yahoo and Google campaign structures are "likely very different." Though you may rely on Google campaigns running on broad or phrase match, Yahoo! creative and keyword lists may need to go much deeper. In addition, unless you really want the highest possible volume of clicks from a listing, your ad creative may be better served with a clear message about the product or service you provide. In Google, less-than-compelling ad creative is penalized with a lower quality score. That results in a lower position or more expensive campaign.

Finally: Another reason to keep Yahoo! titles at the maximum length is that often, additional length allows you to more effectively communicate your value to potential customers. On the other hand, you may have already created compact ad titles that communicate with the same level of clarity as longer ones do. Google and MSN forced many of us to become experts at compact communication.

Much more in Kevin's excellent column.

Posted by Gary Price at 12:52 PM | Permalink

December 7, 2005

Google Once Again Looking for Ad Quality Raters

We've blogged numerous times about Google and their quality rater program. A quick note to let you know that once again Google is looking for ad quality raters. It's a temp job for people who are able to work in the US or Canada. Here's a link to the job posting that went live on Monday. This post has a look back at other postngs about human quality raters at Google, MSN, and Yahoo inclduing this item about the raters hub in use at Google.

Postscript: I just noticed that G is also looking for rateers in more languages: + Quality Rater, Chinese Language (Work in U.S., or Canada) + Ads Quality Rater - German Language (Work in U.S., or Canada) + Quality Rater, French Language (Work in U.S., Canada, or France)

Posted by Gary Price at 10:53 AM | Permalink

December 1, 2005

Humans Still Part Of Google Ad Review Process

Yesterday I posted about concerns over the relevancy of ads at Google and the question of whether human review was still being done. Yes, humans are still involved as part of the overall process, though it doesn't seem as if they review each and every ad. I plan to follow up more on this in the near future, but here's what Google sent over on the situation:

Google uses a combination of humans and technology to review keywords and ads for relevancy, editorial guidelines and our content policy. In many cases, ads are reviewed through automated processes first and then followed by human review. This enables ads to go live almost immediately, a feature that many of our advertisers like. We continue to remove ads that don't meet relevancy requirements, editorial guidelines or our content policy.

Quality based minimum bidding is not a replacement for determining, and reviewing for, relevancy. Relevancy is an important factor in determining the Quality Score which is the basis for assigning minimum bids for keywords. Quality-based minimum bidding provides advertisers with more control to bid on keywords that are valuable to them.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:07 AM | Permalink

November 30, 2005

Irrelevant Google Ads, Due To Humans No Longer Checking For Relevancy?

Google, Heal Thyself is a very nice piece from Peter Hershberg at SearchViews that looks at how ads on Google are running in violation of its own editorial policies such as relevancy, allowing multiple ads for the same advertiser, trademark guidelines and other issues. Just for fun, he found all these violations coming up when doing a search for Google. It highlights an issue that a search marketer raised to me back in September. They wrote me:

In our looking into a related client competitor issue, where the competitor was using a keyword that had ZERO relevancy to a linked result, a Google exec said to us, and this is copied from the email:

"Our editorial team no longer monitors nor disapproves individual keywords for relevancy."

Relevancy no longer an issue at Google! Woohoo!

Another search marketer who was included on this email to me and several others responded:

The key here is "editorial team"

Google is convinced that the new quality score system takes over the relevancy responsibility from the editorial team.

Google thinks that the relevant result will have such a high quality score that a competitor would need to spend many times more to displace the result with a high quality score.

Whether that is in fact true or not depends on how "crazy" the competitive bidder will be on a generic non-relevant keyword.

I've been meaning to follow up on this, so I'll drop a note over to Google and see what the deal is -- are ads really no longer being human reviewed? Do they really assume relevancy can be determined through the new quality scoring system?

Want to comment or discuss? Visit our Search Engine Watch Forums thread, AdWords No Longer Human Reviewed?

Postscript: Yes, humans are still involved as part of the overall process, though it doesn't seem as if they review each and every ad, Google says. For more, see Humans Still Part Of Google Ad Review Process.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:47 AM | Permalink

October 4, 2005

Apple Europe Crackdown On Google Ads?

Spotted via Steve Rubel, Apple Cracks Down on Google AdWords at TidBITS suggests that Apple may be pushing on Google to enforce rules preventing advertisers from having ads show up in response to its trademarks in Europe.

Though the ads were initially said to have been stopped because of the use of the word "Mac" in the ad text, it later turned out that the complaint involved ads targeting that word that were showing up in the EU. The solution seemed to be restricting the ads to show up only in the US.

Google's trademark policy differs in the US and the UK. In the US, you can target ads to show up in response to terms that are also trademarks. You simply cannot use trademarked terms in ad COPY, if a trademark holder objects. In the EU, Google may restrict the ability to target ads to show up in response to terms that are also trademarks AND/OR the use of those terms in ad copy.

Why? Google has faced different lawsuits. In the US, the GEICO case found that linking ads to terms that are also trademarks was not confusing nor a trademark violation. But the court did think the use of trademarked terms in ad copy potentially might be confusing. Google's policy in the US gave it an end run around this.

In the EU, Google's lost cases about ads being triggered by terms that are also trademarks, thus the tighter policy.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:52 AM | Permalink

June 14, 2005

Google Denies Pulling Anti-Clinton Ads Running Anti-Clinton Banners from DMNews.com has Google saying no. Ads that were initially approved continue to run. However, Google admits that some ads were rejected as advocating against a person, as opposed to a political agenda. The author and publisher of a book about the Clintons claims that all ads were removed. More from them in this press release.

Did Google pull anti-Bill & Hillary Clinton ads after initially approving them? Google Defends Not Last month, Google came under accusations of favoring liberal ads after removing a conservative ad that mimicked the same wording as a democratic ads. Flap Over Political Ads Underscores Problems With Google Delay In Reviewing Ads has more details. See also Google Posts New Ad Guidelines which explains that political ads are allowed, as long as they take issue with issues, rather than individuals.

FYI, neither the DMNews story nor the press release say what keywords were involved, so I can't check on the ads. However, a search for hillary clinton brings up both pro and con ads, plus eBay hawking merchandise:

Hillary Enables a Rapist Read the shocking stories that Bill & Hillary Clinton covered up. www.realclintonlegacy.com Hillary Clinton in 2008 3,000+ Unique Hillary Products Tshirts, Bumper Stickers, Mugs, etc CafePress.com Hillary for President T-Shirts, Bumper Stickers & More; Great Prices - Fast Shipping www.XpressYourView.com Bill Raped Hillary Book The Truth About Hillary Hardcover For Only $16.47 BagOfMags.com "The Truth About Hillary" Save time with the summary of Edward Klein's bestseller. CapitolReader.com President Hillary Clinton 2008 is closer than you think! Bumper stickers, buttons, t-shirts. www.BeatBushGear.com President Hillary? Know who's in the running for the White House in 2008. www.ovaloffice2008.com Hillary Clinton Everything to do with Hillary Clinton. eBay.com

Clicking on the first ad also led me to this page at Amazon, where the book in question is being sold. So I'm assuming that at least some of the ads the press release complains about being removed are in fact still running.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:20 AM | Permalink

May 9, 2005

Flap Over Political Ads Underscores Problems With Google Delay In Reviewing Ads

More calls that Google might be to slow in reviewing ads to ensure they meet its guidelines are covered in this Media Post story, Google Slow To Police AdWords.

The article focuses on last week's removal of ads from both conservative organization RightMarch.org and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

Both ads, which ran on April 28, were ultimately taken down by Google for violations of the editorial policy, but RightMarch's ad was removed earlier than the anti-Delay ad, leading to accusations of left-wing bias. Google declined to state how long ads are online before being reviewed, or how many ads are rejected a day. But others in the industry say that it can take a few days before Google catches on that there's a problem with an ad. Peter Hershberg, a managing partner at search engine marketing company Reprise Media, said it typically takes Google's editorial team 72 hours to remove ads that violate Google's policies.

Issues with Google's ad policing system and policies far from new. In January, I posted about some strange/inappropriate ads that I seen. This Business Week article: Google's Ads -- and Minuses, contains more examples.

Danny's NYT On Google Ad Copy Policies - Overture Barely Gets A Mention covers how all ads at Google are supposed to be reviewed by humans, ideally within 24 hours. Also see Google Posts New Ad Guidelines which explains that political ads are allowed, as long as they take issue with issues, rather than individuals.

Postscript: I just came across a story that reports that this weekend anti-Delay ads were still appearing on Google results pages.

Posted by Gary Price at 11:56 AM | Permalink

March 22, 2005

Yahoo Posts Ad Guidelines & Ad API Info

Yahoo has posted new guidelines about what's acceptable in its search advertising plus some information about its long-standing API system for advertisers.

In my Overture Says No To Guns, Sort Of post, I explained how Yahoo needed to assemble an easy guide to what allowed -- and what's not -- in search ads. The new Unacceptable Content page from Yahoo now provides this guidance. FYI, Google posted a similar guide last year, as explained more in my Google Posts New Ad Guidelines post.

I've also written about the Yahoo API offered to advertisers, something that hasn't been documented on the Yahoo or Overture sites. They've corrected that now, and the new Overture Web Services page provides more info.

For further background, see my The Overture API: Advertiser Web Services post. Also see the Yahoo Search Makes APIs Publicly Available post for info about the new API that taps into Yahoo Search, rather than Yahoo's advertising system.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 1:40 PM | Permalink

February 23, 2005

Google's Blogger and Unwanted Software

An eWeek article: Spyware Snags Blogger Users, reports on a new study by Harvard researcher, Benjamin Edelman that says that "dozens" of blogs hosted by Google's Blogger/Blogspot trick visitors and install spyware and adware onto visitors' computers.

The offending blogs typically prompt visitors to accept downloads through misleading pop-up windows, said Ben Edelman, a vocal spyware critic and Harvard University researcher. While a user typically must accept the download before the software installs, the prompts often attempt to trick users by disguising the download as a necessary Windows or Internet Explorer upgrade.

You can read the complete study: How Google's Blogspot Helps Spread Unwanted Software, here.

Posted by Gary Price at 4:13 PM | Permalink

February 7, 2005

Overture Says No To Guns, Sort Of

Google's pretty well known for not allowing gun ads, which can get gun merchants upset that porn ads are allowed but gun ads aren't. But Overture doesn't allow gun ads, as well. A new move? That's what I wondered when the issue came up on our forum thread Overture now banning gun related ads? last November.

Overture told me a ban on gun ads had been in place for over two years. But then forum moderator AussieWebmaster noted that a search for gun on Overture brought back some paid listings. Checking again today, I see one there that leads to a hunting web site that sells pistols, shotguns, rifles and revolvers. So if there is a ban, it's a leaky one.

Meanwhile, there's nothing in Overture's listing guidelines that seems to advertisers that gun ads are not allowed. In contrast, there are special regulations for:

  • Adult sites: can only bid on certain terms; must carry disclaimer.  
  • Gambling sites: not allowed.  
  • Online pharmacies: must gain third party approval in order to advertise; Canadian pharmacies aren't supposed to market to Americans.

The guidelines also had specific rules until some time within 2004 covering:

  • Job/Employment: terms "job" and "employment" could only be sold to web sites dealing specifically with "an employee/employer relationship." IE, services such as job interview preparation weren't allowed.  
  • Cars/Auto: To big on the term "car" or related terms sites had to offer cars for sale, rental or lease, repair services or information.  
  • Wine: Sites selling win had to be approved by a third party service, similar to how the current online pharmacy approval program works.

You can see the old guidelines here. They're dated from June 2003 and no longer linked to on the Overture web site (that I can see), but I could still find them through a search on both Yahoo and Google.

If those guidelines are dated June 2003, why do I say they were still active at some point in 2004? Google's cached copy of a version of the current page still shows information about the job, car and wine ad restrictions in place and a 2004 copyright date at the bottom (the date of the Google page cache itself is useless. A server error appears to give the page a date of 1969).

Going back to the forum discussion, some correspondence from Overture's support department has been posted suggesting that gun ads aren't a problem, as long as they don't involve assault weapons.

The entire thing underscores the fact that if there are going to be restrictions placed on any ad, then these should be spelled out clearly for advertisers before ads are actually placed. Google seems to have finally learned this lesson, with an expanded set of rules that was published in November: Google Posts New Ad Guidelines. It seems like Overture may have more spelling out that it needs to do, as well.

Postscript: Overture tells me there is indeed a ban on ads for sites that sell or give away "Automatic weapons, military-style assault weapons, as well as products and parts that make these weapons work." and that a policy on this is being readied for publication on its site. Postscript 2: Guidelines have now been posted, as covered here: Yahoo Posts Ad Guidelines & Ad API Info

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 7:54 AM | Permalink

January 25, 2005

Low Priced Women On eBay: More Automated Ad Problems At Google

Over in our forums, the Google Ad Complaint thread takes a look at some issues we've discussed before where automation in search ads can lead to confusing, if not misleading, product pitches.

Member tankgreen came across this ad on Google that was upsetting:

Women For Sale Low Priced Women. Big Selection! (aff) ebay.co.uk

"I find the advertisement for the sale of a human being through an on-line auction house completely offensive," tankgreen posted.

Other members quickly jumped in to explain that women were not actually being sold on eBay. Instead, ad automation means that you can bid on a variety of terms and have those terms automatically inserted within your ad copy. So if you bid broadly on a term like "women," to help sell items that include that word in them (women shoes, women clothes), you can also wind up inadvertently selling women themselves.

Eventually, the official Google rep who monitors discussions on the forum, AdWordsRep, provided an apology. He also offered a long post explaining how despite having policies of review, when hundreds of thousands of ads are running, things can slip through the cracks. To quote one part:

While it is unfortunate, occasionally a potentially offensive ad will shown until it can be reviewed. And, equally, when a reviewer is looking at 10,000, or 50,000, or maybe even 250,000 keywords, they may miss the fact that a few of them may be inappropriate when inserted into the ad itself.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:19 AM | Permalink

January 13, 2005

NYT On Google Ad Copy Policies - Overture Barely Gets A Mention

Advertisers on Google Are Told to Keep It Proper from the New York Times looks at how it's not anything goes with ads on Google, in terms of language, spelling and grammar.

Yahoo-owned Overture has policies like this too -- and has had them longer than Google since it was Overture, not Google, that created that paid search revolution that both companies are now harvesting.

You might not realize this from the article. The fact that Overture has policies warrants an "also" mention way, way, way down at the bottom of the page. That's it. Despite having a nearly even split of the search ad world, the good/poor folks over at Overture didn't apparently warrant a quote or any extended look.

To put this in perspective, it's like the New York Times just did a big article about how NBC -- a major television network in the US -- has editorial policies on its ads but didn't bother to examine or talk to those from ABC or CBS -- equally large networks.

The article focus isn't on some of Google's controversial ad policies that have come up in the past. Instead, it's more about language and creative issues. "Check em out" wasn't allowed in an ad the story's author had placed, but "check them out" was. That sort of thing.

Hey, nice to see the Denver News Agency so knowledgeable about Google's ad system. It chimes in to the story with: "Google's ads are just placed online without any human interaction."

Um, no. First of all, some human interaction placed the ad in the first place. It IS true that ads are allowed to go online at Google before review (unlike the case with Overture, kudos to them) which has made for some embarrassment with Google in the past. But all ads, Google says, are supposed to be reviewed by humans at some point, usually within 24 hours.

The time may be longer with some ads that hit terms that aren't very frequent or which generate little revenue, but it may only be hours before an ad for popular terms or which generates much revenue is reviewed, said Salar Kamangar, director of product management at Google, told me last week when I talked with him about Google's new one ad per merchant policy. But all ads are supposed to be eventually reviewed.

Having said this, there's still the case where ads tapping into automated creation of titles and description aren't really going before humans at both Google and Overture. Gary's post last month points out some issues this raises: Poor Relevancy and Automated Search Ads.

For some related information on this topic see:

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:16 AM | Permalink

January 7, 2005

Google To Restrict Affiliate Ads

Google is to limit the number of affiliate ads that show up in search results, as has been rumored over the past few weeks. Advertisers are now being notified of the change, and it will go into effect over the coming weeks, Google says.

With the change, Google will allow only one ad to lead to a particular web page per query, whether that ad be from an affiliate of the web site or the web site owner.

"We've seen and heard from users that there are many cases where we are showing the same creative with the same visible URL linking to the same page, said Salar Kamangar, director of product management at Google, explaining users don't like this. "Just like with search where we have duplicate removal, we want to make sure we aren't showing duplicated ads."

Which exact ad gets selected depends on which ad has the highest "Ad Rank" within Google's AdWords system. That is, the cost per click they are willing to pay multiplied by the clickthrough rate. If an official site has a higher Ad Rank than affiliates, then that will be the ad selected. If it is an affiliate with a higher Ad Rank, the affiliate ad will be shown.

The program will not prevent multiple affiliates for the same company from bidding on a term, as long as they want to drive traffic to their own sites. However, the affiliates will have to drive people to original content. Just linking to a page that has little content other than a link outbound to Amazon -- that isn't allowed.

The Up Close On Google Affiliate Ad Changes article for Search Engine Watch members provides additional details on the changes, along with some illustrations and examples of how things work now and what will be allowed after the change. If you're a member, be sure to check it out.

Want to discuss the changes or learn more from what others are discussing? Visit our forum thread: AdWords Restriction Of 1 Affiliate Per Merchant Announced. A copy of the letter Google sent out to advertisers is also posted in that thread.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 2:15 AM | Permalink

November 2, 2004

FindWhat Will Drop Gambling Ads

A Clickz article reports that FindWhat will soon stop showing gambling ads for IP addresses that they determine come from the United States or where a location cannot be determined.

Such gambling advertising accounted for $2.3 million in revenues in the third quarter. The company said it felt halting the display of such ads in the U.S. was the prudent thing to do, given the industry and law enforcement climate.

The announcement was made yesterday during FindWhat's Q3 financial results conference call. You can listen to the complete call here.

For more on gambling ads and search advertising see Danny's, Lawsuit Filed Over Search & Gambling Ads and Yahoo Bans Online Casino Ads; Google's Ban Has Holes.

Want to comment or discuss?

Visit the Gambling Ads On Search Sites thread in the SEW Forums.

Posted by Gary Price at 8:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

October 20, 2004

Google Advertising Forecasts Obtained by the SF Chronicle

Verne Kopytoff at the San Francisco Chronicle has once again gotten access to some internal Google documents. These dccs show that the company is planning to to add 372,000 new advertisers during the next four years.

The internal Google documents obtained by The Chronicle give unusual detail about the matter. They include advertising forecasts that have not been publicly disclosed.

Google predicted that the number of advertiser accounts will jump from 280,000 this year to 378,000 in 2005, according to the documents. From 2004 to 2008, the number of accounts is expected to more than double to 652,050.

Google expects its advertiser accounts to grow 35 percent between 2004 and 2005, according to the internal documents. However, Google estimates that the growth rate will decline to 15 percent between 2007 and 2008.

More in the article: Google forecasts growth Search engine sees 372,000 new ad accounts in 4 years A chart showing estimated advertiser growth is also available.

Posted by Gary Price at 11:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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