No more BIDDING on 'free' in ringtone campaigns!?

So I just talked to my rep and he informed me of a new policy at AZ that not only can we not even bid on the word free (Im not talking about not having it in our ads or landing pages but even bidding on it), we have to use it as a negative match so our ads dont show when someone searches for anything with 'free' ringtones in it. Anyone else know about this?

 

I understand it if companies say "Don't bid on our tradename" but I can't understand them admonishing us not to bid on generic words. If I want to bid on "free" for a campaign that costs $$$, I should be able to--even if it is a really stupid way to conduct your AdWords campaign.

 

Well NO ONE can own the word Free, it isn't a trademark, so bid all you want. Im so sick of advertisers and such thinking they can OWN keywords. They can control the DISPLAY of their trademark but not the keywords. This is the same thing as them banning you from saying there trademark.

 

The advertisers can say that they don't want to pay you if you don't agree to or follow their terms though. Can't they?....

I had an offer I was doing good on, and then they told me that I couldnt bid on anything with a VERY broad word in it and also a broad popular phrase. It sucked and I was pissed.

 

Well the problem is all the legal stuff with 'free ringtones'. You can bid all you want sure but do and AZ will not pay you. Ive allready had 2 warnings from the compliance dept.

 

Ya they can... but advertisers that give their affiliates the means to succeed (by not being doosh's) will prosper

 

We mean jack shit to the advertisers. Regardless, if you're playing their game you have to play by their rules.

 

100% false

100% correct

1 out of 2 is not bad

 

lol..

It's strange to me though that AZ hasnt made more of an official statement about this. Ive heard from a couple people their affiliate managers have let them know but most people seem in the dark.

 

Again bidding on the keyword is different from displaying something.

 

its their business, they can do whatever they want. if you dont like it, dont use them. sadly, its the way it goes.

whats all the hoopla with ringtones? copyrights? like mp3s?

 

the hoopla is that people were (and to some extent still are) promoting ringtones as free, and using deceptive practices to hide that they ppl were going to be charged monthly. And there isn't and legal problems yet, just a couple detectives looking into it.

 

155% correct.

 

They are after "free" & "100% complimentary". You cannot use those even in meta tags

 

Please contact your affiliate manager for additional clarification on this subject.

Jonathan

 

Affiliate companies and ringtone providers would make more money if they let you promote these words so don't blame them. It's a legal issue.

It's obvious that 99% of ringtone landing pages do their best to hide the fact that they aren't free. Take that teal green DADA landing page. It says 9.99 in a light pale teal green on a white background in the top corner with nothing to draw your attention anywhere in that direction. I'm sure that past lawsuits require these companies to display the price in a "prominent location" and they still do everything they can to hide it while still playing by the rules.

These guys are creative and they know just how to bend the rules. They got sued and couldn't say free anymore, but you still could in your ads. Next they got sued again and you could still bid free but couldn't say it in the ad anymore. Now you can't do any of that, but you aren't required to say it's not free. That will be next and the whole ringtone affiliate market will go to shit.

 

Wrong. I make my landing pages to where it is very obvious that they are not free and i still get conversions.

 

Yeah, but I'm sure you're not getting outrageous returns like back in the day.

People will actually have to SELL the ringtone service on their landing page now, rather than giving away free ringtones and sneaking a 10 dollar a month membership in there.

$9.99 a month for 10 ringtones really isn't all that bad though if you know you're paying it.

 

it's really not, thats how i sell it. And the best part is you can argue for better payouts because your conversions dont flake out.

 

Yes as really if you look at it a 1.00 a ringtone aint bad. Think the trend will be a change from people deciving to people acknowledging there is a cost... but as coop states it wil still convert.