Search Marketing Blog
BANNED FOR LIFE by Google
Posted by Sean McMahon on 11.19.2009
In an very revealing article this week, Advertising Age reported that Google has enacted new, harsh policies to prevent advertisers in its AdWords network from generating fraudulent ads and damaging malware links. In the latest attempt to protect the integrity of their search results, the world’s largest search engine now levies the threat of having a Web site banned for life from its search index if it places ads within their network that contain links that download malware or promote illegitimate offers with the intent to deceive visitors.
The November 17, 2009 article titled Google Fights to Protect Itself Against Ad Scammers states that Google “started disabling AdWords accounts of perpetrators earlier this fall, and is now stepping up those efforts to try to eliminate the mini-economy of fraudsters that continue to plague text advertising.”
This new stringent policy is a major shift from the search behemoth’s fraud prevention measures to date, which have relied on its algorithm-based technologies to recognize and disable fraudulent ads within their network. With this new announcement, it is evident that Google is now policing ads at the client level, instead of at the Web site level. This means that the company is attempting to eliminate not just the offending ad from their system, but also the actual offender by banning the site for life.
With the announcement of this new policy, it is even now more important than ever to ensure that your Paid Search Marketing accounts features ad copy and listings that strictly abide by Google’s rules and regulations. As you can see, one misstep could get your company or agency permanently removed from the world’s largest search marketplace.
