Transparency Coming to the AdWords Content Network

Via this article in the NYT:


"In the next few months, Google’s advertiser reports will begin listing the sites where each ad runs, Ms. Malone said. "

That comment was in reference to the content network.

This is a great move by Google and will give AdWords advertisers a new level of control and influence of their ROI in the content network. Before you know it it looks like you'll be able to esssentially build your own content network.

Thoughts and comments welcome.

Additional Coverage:
http://searchengineland.com/070226-093349.php
http://www.jensense.com/archives/2007/02/google_to_begin.html
http://www.ppcdiscussions.com/2007/02/transparency-coming-to-adwords-content.html

 

Good stuff..and one more small nail in the mfa coffin.

 

Yea, this will take some of the pressure off of Google to clean up the content network. When this change rolls in advertisers will simply exclude all the garbage site in the content network, Google won't have to do a thing.

 

sounds good, I've switched off my content netwrok recently it'd been giving such awful returns.

 

This is good news. I can't help but wonder if it's a reactive move on Google's part to keep advertisers opting-in, though, since quite a few advertisers see consistently better returns and CTR from the search network rather than the content network.

-T

 

Personally I think they're doing this for a few reasons;

1. They can essentially stop policing the content network.

2. Complaints about the crap sites in the content network has done nothing but increase.

3. I'm sure they have seen at least a slight erosion in the average cpc in the content network. I know quite a few people who use AdWords and without fail they have either opted out of the content network all together or dropped their bids to a fraction of what they pay in the search network.

4. I would have to think that Google realizes the more control they give to advertisers the better those advertisers will be able to maximize their ROI which will keep them using the AdWords platform.

5. They can essentially stop policing the content network

 

Hopefully this will eventually mean that people running quality sites with AdSense will see a return of advertisers to the content network, and start to generate more from their quality content.

I know that for all my e-commerce clients we've turned off the content network, and found it only performs effectively for brand building. Perhaps with this new feature it'll be worth experimenting again, although I do feel that the majority of people who see a content ad aren't at a purchase stage and so content network will inherently give a worse ROI than search.

 

It has been announced that Google will soon advise Advertisers where their ads are run across the Adsense Publisher Network. This move gives advertisers some previously missing information to help the advertiser decide where their ad money is best spent.

You might recall Google allowed publishers to purchase ads on targeted websites in April 2005, however advertisers till this point, were left out in the cold as Google only fed the amount of impressions and clicks to the advertisers.

More here

 

That's pretty neat - glad to see Google is willing to help. Thanks for sharing that!

 

This will probably be very bad news for MFA sites. It will also improve credability of the adwords/adsense further.

 

Very good news for advertisers. Who would have thought Google could be so transparent and helpful?!

 

1. Having recently lost both Espn and Cox media content to Quigo, Google has begun feeling the heat (as absurd as this may sound). It's not that Google wants to do this, but rather has to do it.

More about it here.

2. I disagree, I'm not sure that all advertisers will chose exactly where they want to advertise, therefore google will still have to check (or police) ads.

 

That's why I said essentially

They will still police the network to a certain extent but allowing people to roll their own content network will take some of the pressure off Google in this area.

It's good stuff all around though - can't roll it out soon enough imo.

 

I am hearing from several quality content publishers that they are scared about this change. How do you guys feel this will affect quality content publishers using adsense?

 

Quality publishers will benefit, less that quality publishers will not.

 

Quality publishers (Myself included) should be looking forward to this, as I think a lot of advertisers will be willing to use the content network again when there's more transparency (and therefore trust)

 

Here is a pretty good comment on Jensense´s blog



So in a while instead of using Google Adwords advertisers will be able to contact publishers directly and make a deal with them.

 

Won't be an issue with any large advertisers - working with individual sites and webmasters is more hassle than it's worth.

Not to mention advertisers can easily do that now if they want and for the most part I would say they are not.

 

I like this. It will definitely allow for cherry picking which means more competition for face time on the better converting sites and a lot less competition and revenue for the lower level sites.

 

Update - here's the first sighting I've seen of this being live.