Google Revises Trademark Trigger Policy

[confuscius]

Lots of abuse going on today already - lots of Brand bidding and no attempt to even hide affiliate ids in some cases.

Should the networks be more proactive in setting up formal abuse reporting mechanisms? Or do such mechanisms already exist?

[drivetowin]

Affiliate Window have an automated tool called Snoopy so they will be aware of any brand bidding on their merchants. From memory I think OMG have a similar tool too.

[Brigadoon]

Originally Posted by confuscius Lots of abuse going on today already - lots of Brand bidding and no attempt to even hide affiliate ids in some cases. Should the networks be more proactive in setting up formal abuse reporting mechanisms? Or do such mechanisms already exist?

Why should anyone attempt to hide an affiliate link in ppc? Serves no purpose!

[Shane]

Originally Posted by drivetowin Affiliate Window have an automated tool called Snoopy so they will be aware of any brand bidding on their merchants. From memory I think OMG have a similar tool too.

Perhaps OMG should switch it on then seeing as affiliate 3897 has been bidding on virgin and using their display url in the dark hours for several weeks if not longer !

UK Credit Card
0% Balance Transfer. 0% on Credit
Card Purchases for 3 months
virginmoney.com
Virgin Credit Card - UK Credit Cards, 0% balance transfer and discount offers

[confuscius]

It is just the fact that you have to dig deeper on some landing sites /pages to work out who the offending affiliate is - just the apparent abuse blatancy level that changes.

Snoopy seems to be taking a snooze.

[Travel Pixel]

Theres some grubbiness around today for sure, lots of greedy eyes and foolish minds I think....heres one for 'inkfactory':

inkfactory - Google Search

Two affs that i can see there, both with fake display urls.

Google must be raking it in on the poor quality competitor ads aswell.

[Matthew Wood]

Some rather greedy affiliates out there is seems happy to break the rules in a moment of uncertainty and change.

My question is whether the networks will quickly tackle the situation?

That said this is a sudden switch in reality everyone needs a little time to settle in as its not always the affiliates fault.

It does surprise me however that some of these affiliates are very large indeed and really should know better - brand rules are expressed by the merchant not Google.

[bapages]

And don't forget there is alot of closed bidding groups out there.

[Brigadoon]

Originally Posted by Matthew Wood That said this is a sudden switch in reality everyone needs a little time to settle in as its not always the affiliates fault.

Agree Matthew, Plenty of ads that are now showing were written years ago, but never got any impressions due to the trademark ban. I have noticed some ads with aff & affiliate at the end of the text, indicating that the ads must be over 2 years old!

[Rich79]

Are people finding that merchants are changing their Ts & Cs to forbid their affiliates from bidding on competitor brand terms or are they happy for affiliates to be doing this?

It's a tricky one, maybe merchants should look to the golden rule of philosophy "do unto others....."??

The other golden rule is of course to protect your tool

[bapages]

i am getting fed up of the e-mails saying the same thing.

[confuscius]

Interesting to see that an awful lot of brand ads are appearing in an attempt to hijack brand traffic to generics such as insurances and loans - looks like the lawyers are going to be busy! Try a Marks and Spencer search - some big names playing silly b's.

[tomj]

wininvesting.co.uk seems to be showing up on brands like Google, Yahoo, Amazon, Ebay.......damn that broad match

[Qui Gon Jinn]

And how will lawyers get their heads around broadmatch, expanded match, automatic match, synonymn match, embedded search, contextual when so many merchants, networks, agencies & affiliates don't even partially or fully grasp their similarities & differences. Blimey some can't tell if something is sponsored link or an an affiliate link or neither.

To "appear" or to "actually bid" that is the question.

[ian-d]

Unfortunatly this was always going to happen, the second these rules were dropped, adwords went crazy. Still, will be making google a very tidy sum!!!

Problem now is what this will do to the affiliate industry, its safe to say that most of us will obide by the rules, but unfortunatly some won't, and unless the merchant are going to spend a fortune actively preventing unauthorised ads, then this could be very damaging.

I took the decision a few weeks ago to do down the route of SEO only, and that looks like a wise decision.