(Hello this is my first topic, hope I am not doing anything wrong)
I noticed as an Adwords user that from 30 June 2016, they were no longer accepting Flash ads, and were asking you instead to submit a very demanding HTML5 code (i.e. it has to come with everything; css font and all and not link to any resource externally so forget about embedding an iframe and such) if you want to advertise anything that is not a static image. (or GIf less than 150kb, they also take much more time to approve Gifs than simple images in my experience and often had to contact them campaigns in which they just approve all the JPG and forget about the GIFs).
This strikes me as the perfect reason for the abysmal drop in earning (-30% average RPM), that I have had in July, as there is no other reason really, nothing else changed. And I notice that the trend in continuing in August. If Google is making it more difficult for advertisers then it's no wonder.
I can also add the time taken by Google to approve Ads is just enormous compared to other networks, and is definitely contributing to drive the advertiser to these networks instead. I have rarely had to wait more than 2 hours on Facebook for a campaign to get approved, whereas on Google it is more like 24 to 36 hours and if on weekends then that becomes 48 hours. This is my own experience, it might depend on my location as I imagine very well Google (trying to "smart out" by) applying extra scrutiny and caution for non-US-CA-Europe accounts. But that will still impact the overall advertiser spending as not all advertisers are US-Europe.
