Google AdWords Announcement

[Frostie]

Originally posted by kbudden
...if I create a webpage at www.xxx.com/comet.php and point to that then even if all that page says is 'click here to visit comet' with an affiliate link to comet then that is ok

Tsss ouch... this is going to hurt a few I think.

As Keith mentions above, as I read it, this is fine, but I also suspect that Google may in the future change their policy again so that this isn't allowed.

Also, what about meta-refresh's - there is no mention of any auto-redirecting in the email? Maybe you could have a landing page shown for 1 second that will then refresh via your affiliate link or even 301's??

Doesn't affect me directly as I stopped back in November, but was hoping to restart in the next week or so - now have to stop and have a think! lol

[Graham@Buyagift]

one ad per search query for affiliates and parent companies sharing the same URL

So if the merchant and their affiliates are bidding on the term "Wigs", is it only one of the ads will be displayed, or the merchant and one affiliate?

Graham

[AffManagement]

Thanks Ian I stand corrected on the domain names, though i guess there will be some considering what domain best to use for this purpose.

[watcher]

I'm not sure that a simple landing page with a 'click here' link will be acceptable - all you are doing is adding an extra click for the user - which really can't be seen to be improving the user experience.

Having said that, I doubt Google can manually review every single landing page. More likely they will use a spider to try and determine an amount of coherent content - those pages that appear borderline to the spider will then be submitted for a manual review.

I'm only speculating, of course.

[sticky]

think you could be right - as the user is now further away from the site they want. THink they may review landing pages as well, could it be that once they know its an affiliate site then they ban that domain from any ads (surely they dont hate affiliates that much though.........)

[ianm]

Simple 'click here pages' probably won't work in the long run, which is where a lot of the 'direct to merchant' PPC people will have problems.

It is now becoming a bit more SEO like - you will need to build a page that tempts the user to click and also doesn't upset Google.

[matbennett]

one ad per search query for affiliates and parent companies sharing the same URL

I suspect many merchants will alter their PPC policy to simply stop affiliates using their domains in Adwords.

[999gi]

Graham - I read it as one advert per keyword/url combination whether merchant or affiliate

So you couldnt have a merchant and an affiliate both bidding on wigs if the both went to www.merchant.com/wigs.htm

However you presumably could have as many as you wanted if the merchant set up lots of mirror landing pages like wigs2.html, wigs3.html for each affiliate to link into

[ianm]

Originally posted by 999gi
However you presumably could have as many as you wanted if the merchant set up lots of mirror landing pages like wigs2.html, wigs3.html for each affiliate to link into

I don't think so - when they say URL they mean www.mysite.co.uk - so even if the merchant set up multiple landing pages they are all on the same URL

[Graham@Buyagift]

Hmmm, that thought crossed my mind although I would hazard a guess that it's based on the domain rather than the full url.

Graham

[999gi]

I guess only time will tell - we can pick at their language (to me URL means the whole web page address which is different to domain) however who knows if they are consciously making that destinction in their choice of language

[Supercod]

If everyone going to have to make their own landing page sites, I can see this having the effect of turning PPC affiliates in to a cross breed of SEO affiliate as well, so what you lose from direct to merchant, you gain on free SEO traffic.. well that all sounds very positive but hey their always a bright side, all be it a small one

[covron]

I can see this having the effect of turning PPC affiliates in to a cross breed of SEO affiliate as well, so what you lose from direct to merchant, you gain on free SEO traffic..

This is where I think Google is shooting itself in the foot.
More landing pages = more pages in the serps saying very similar things cluttering up Google search results.

The searcher then has to go through loads more search page results just to find any unique content.

Can't understand their thinking here.

[KieronD]

Originally posted by Supercod
If everyone going to have to make their own landing page sites, I can see this having the effect of turning PPC affiliates in to a cross breed of SEO affiliate as well, so what you lose from direct to merchant, you gain on free SEO traffic.. well that all sounds very positive but hey their always a bright side, all be it a small one

This is a very valid point. I have made a few landing pages for some of my Overture ppc keywords and somehow have ended up number 1 for that key phrase in Google!! Hence lots of free traffic as well as the paid for Overture clicks.

Of course I tell everybody that this was all by design and not a fluke as I am secretly a SEO expert. Cough!

Kieron

[aotagain]

What exactly does this mean...?

"we will display the ad with the highest Ad Rank..." ??

Does that mean the highest bid per click or do they measure in some other way as well ?