Google has become increasingly strict, but also schizophrenic in its handling of ads by affiliates.
This raises two issues in my mind:
1) Why does Google care about these ads being labeled as from "affiliates" (or, more frequently, "aff")?
I honestly am not sure on this one. Assuming the ad accurately describes the service or product being sold, does the visitor really care whether a middleman is getting a commission... especially when the visitor ends up at the same site anyway (ebay, amazon, etc.)?
2) How can Google effectively communicate the status and meaning of an affiliate ad?
Right now, Google is requiring affiliates to use "affiliate" or "aff" within the ad text, sometimes with particularly stringent punctuation restrictions. Aside from being frustrating for the advertiser, does this 'disclosure' really inform the customer at all? If Google took a survey of 1,000 people viewing AdWords, how many would know what "aff" means? Certainly, IMHO, a very small minority.
Therefore, if Google insists on having this disclosure made, may I respectfully suggest that it uses a more simple and standardized indicator, and then explains it? For instance, why not add a small unique symbol to all affiliate ads, and then at the top and bottom of pages displaying adwords, simply list the symbol and put (hyperlinked) "Affiliate" -- and then link that to either a small popup or a new-window page that would explain what an affiliate (and affiliate ad) is and why this matters.
What do you think about this?
1) Why does Google care about these ads being labeled as from "affiliates" (or, more frequently, "aff")?
I honestly am not sure on this one. Assuming the ad accurately describes the service or product being sold, does the visitor really care whether a middleman is getting a commission... especially when the visitor ends up at the same site anyway (ebay, amazon, etc.)?
perfect working solution, when you have a MERCHANT and 400 affiliates bidding on the same term, at least it allows the MERCHANT to be different from the affiliates.
many a time I will type in the name of a company, and see 4-5 ads, 1 from the merchant and the rest from affiliates.
Shak
Why does Google care about these ads being labeled as from "affiliates"
Affiliates give the big companies the ability to dominate the AdWords real estate. The big company have their ad in there while the affs take up the bottom. Mom and pop are shut out.
I know because I set up several accounts for local merchants and had to call up Google to not only have the affs properly labeled, but to limit the amount of affs allowed to advertise.
I'm an aggressive advocate for my clients and you better believe that I'll level the playing field for my people to squeeze the best return on their investment.
why not add a small unique symbol to all affiliate ads, and then at the top and bottom of pages displaying adwords, simply list the symbol and put (hyperlinked) "Affiliate" -- and then link that to either a small popup...
Because it's less transparent than adding "aff" to the creative. Because it's more code for Google. Because it would be a pain in the behind to do.
[edited by: martinibuster at 8:24 am (utc) on Dec. 11, 2003]
perfect working solution, when you have a MERCHANT and 400 affiliates bidding on the same term, at least it allows the MERCHANT to be different from the affiliates.
But again, thinking of the customer, what's the difference, really?
Buy Beautiful Bonnets
For babies, brides, bohemians.
Bright & bodaciously bold (aff)
vs.
Buy Beautiful Bonnets
For babies, brides, bohemians.
Bright & bodaciously bold
In each case, the consumer gets the same message and is directed to the same page.
I'm not trying to be nitpicky here, honest! And furthermore, I COULD see arguments in favor of having Google ban affiliates from using AdWords entirely (though frankly I think this would be ultimately bad for consumers AND merchants!)
But from my perspective, forcing affiliates to label their ads does nothing to reduce clutter, actually inform consumers, or help out folks in any way that I can detect.
Affiliates give the big companies the ability to dominate the AdWords real estate. The big company has their ad in there, and the affs take up the bottom. Mom and pop are shut out.I know because I set up several accounts for local merchants and had to call up Google to not only have the affs properly labeled, but to limit the amount of affs allowed to advertise.
I'm an aggressive advocate for my clients and you better believe that I'll level the playing field for my people to squeeze the best return on their investment.
Martinibuster, I'm afraid you've totally lost me here. Who are your clients? And if affiliates are such a problem for them, why don't they modify their Affiliates Agreement to prohibit affiliates from using PPC engines whatsoever. Isn't that the easiest and most reasonable route?
If I were selling Pungent Pickles at pungentpickles.com, I might very well forbid my affiliates from bidding on the word pickle (and all misspellings) as part of their agreement with my firm. After all, why should I give my affiliates a commission on traffic I could just as easily and affordably get myself? But that's between me and my affiliates.
Perhaps the folks behind the hypothetical ravingruffles.com might feel differently. Maybe they don't have the time or expertise to do PPC stuff themselves, and are grateful to get new business for the mere 10 or 15% commission they're paying their affiliates.
Again, if this is simply a merchant issue, why should Google be involved at all?
And I have yet to understand how this might be an issue for consumers, unless they're being redirected to landing pages that are an inconvenient detour in their quest (in which case, the problem is the URL used, not the affiliate status!)
...why don't they modify their Affiliates Agreement
The clients I had in mind are the local players bidding in the market against the National Brands who have the affiliates, and are consequently shut out.
David vs. Goliath.
Goliath gets it between the eyes.
I set up several accounts for local merchants...
I guess I should have emphasized their smallness.
You make some interesting points but there are other players involved who have an interest too.
Am I coming closer to grasping your situation?
And if so, how does the labeling of affiliates help the overcrowding and marginalizing of your clients?
Come to think of it, you mentioned that you had contacted Google to "limit the number of affs allowed to advertise." How is this permitted? If I run a bigger-than-mom-and-pop-but-smaller-than-ebay-or-amazon store that has affiliates, are you telling me that Google -- at the behest of yourself and others -- is open to limiting the ability of my medium-sized-store affiliates to bid on AdWords? If so, where does Google draw the line? And do they really have time to evaluate and arbitrate all of this?
Please note that -- as a liberal San Francisco resident -- I'm sensitive to mom-'n'-pop places fighting against goliaths like Walmart and so on. But in a medium such as AdWords, I'm not convinced that such judgment calls should be or even realistically and effectively CAN be made. If so, shouldn't I have a claim that my blog should be higher in the SERPS than the blogs of the goliath A-Listers, since they can afford to buy AdWords to drive traffic to their blogs and I can't? ;)
The question really is, how many searchers know what an affiliate is? Aff make look confusing, but of the non marketing people I talk to, maybe 1 in 4 (very unofficial polling) even know what the term affiliate actually means in regards to the net.
I completely empathize with martinibuster, I have a client who's competition consists of 3 actual stores, yet there are 19 bidders for these terms. These plethora of affiliate bids make it much more difficult for the actual stores to get the recogonition they want, especially if they are mom-n-pop stores which don't have their own affiliate program.
It's not enough to weed out irrelevant searches and have accurate targetting.
Even for a medium sized client I had to battle ebay, who was bidding on our software product name but leading surfers to an ebay results page that didn't have the product. Damn right I got on the phone- and ebay is gone.
I go for whatever foothold or toehold I can get to lower the bids AND bring more prominence to my ads.
Just because a company has the funds to spend $7/click to be number one doesn't mean you have to. My client is paying significantly less than the competition.
Of course, one of the first things you do is weed out your competitors who are bidding on the name of your company. Pretty basic stuff but I've seen large companies whose PPC campaigns are littered with affs and competitors bidding on their name- and driving up the cost doing business.
Just because you have a huge budget doesn't mean you have to spend every penny of it.
Having done some of the small to medium sized campaigns gives me a more nimble view of what's going on over the players who deal in buckets of words and let their CPC run way out of control.
If you, as a company, ask them to not let people use a keyword or AdWord with your BRAND NAME in it, they will conform to your wishes immediately, save a lawsuit.
If, however, your company name is Pickler's Shack, they can't stop other people from bidding on 'Pickle', but they can stop them from bidding on Pickler's Shack. It's a matter of Brand Name recongnition and trademarking.
It's pretty cut and dry.
There are companies however, a ton of them, who don't do PPC themselves, and some of them who even do, who are on CJ.com and let other people bid over them/under them. Why let them do this? I have no idea, it's ludicris, probably simply because they don't know better, aren't sure how it works, or they have that outsourced somewhere..
Basically, I'd say ATLEAST 50% of all affiliate AdWord's take advantage of a brand name. Right or wrong, the company has it within their power to stop it.
Talk about a level playing field. The poor old affiliate is just trying to eak out a living like everybody else, and he/she's is at a huge disadvantage
1. He/she generally speaking has got a small once only commission to work with, no return sales.
2. He/she can't use the adwords tracking tools, because they don't have access to the site.
3. He/she doesn't have the luxury of site statistics to check which keywords and phrases convet to sales.
4. Without these statistics it almost impossible to know the optimum bid value for each keyword word or phrase.
5. And, because of the above will most probably end up bidding on, and paying for, klicks on words and phrases that don't convert at all, therefore bringing his/her over all ROI down.
6. When the site their promoting is changed in some way which adversly affects sales, there's nothing they can do about it, except try and work around it and hope for the best.
7. With the word Aff/Affiliate in the creative he/she has less Ad real estate to work with.
There are I'm sure many more disadvantages which he/she has to overcome.
I would respectfully suggest that the playing field is not only level with regards to affiliates, but tilted considerably in your favour already.
Yes MartiniBuster .. to use your own words "there are other players involved who have an interest too", and some of them just happen to be affiliates.
When you inspect the affiliate Adword's target URL, do you see it going to some click-forwarding site, the affiliate's own site, or the vendor's site?
Which one is fair?
Ash
Do you mean if you put your mouse pointer over the Adwords Ad, because if that's what you mean it should point to the vendors site. The address at the bottom of the Adwords creative.
But if the affiliate has his own domain, let's just say its a comparative site for example, then the URL should point to this.
Also if an affiliate has his own domain he doesn't have to use the word Affiliate or Aff in the creative.
There are in reality a lot more Affiliates using Adwords than many people seem to think.
As long as the URL points to a genuine Domain there shouldn't be a problem as far as I'm concerned.
Chernelle
1) If the ad is taking people directly to the relevant company's site, then no affiliate labeling ("aff") should be necessary.
For instance, if an affiliate of hypothetical petstore BobsBarkers.com puts up an ad for "Bargain Priced Dog Food" and it links to the dog food page on bobsbarkers.com, then -- since the consumer is being taken to the identical page he or she would have arrived on had the actual company bought the ad, no "aff" should be required. The bottom line is that NO ONE should care WHO is purchasing the ad; all that matters is that the ad accurately describes the landing page, and that the landing page in this case is on the actual company's site.
EXAMPLES: www.bobsbarkers.com/cheapdogfood.htm and also www.bobsbarkers.com/cheapdogfood.htm?affid=friendlyfido
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2) If the ad brings users to a site in which the user must then click through to another site to actually procure the good or service, than "aff" should be required.
This is because there's a slight difference to the consumer here, who -- while perhaps privileged by access to a comparison page or a page with additional info on the goods or services -- is still having to go to a different site to complete the transaction.
EXAMPLES: www.affiliateguy.com/cheapdogfood-directory.htm and www.dog-food-directory.com
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Does this make sense to others? Does it indeed seem fair and effective?
[edited by: ThatAdamGuy at 12:25 pm (utc) on Dec. 13, 2003]
I agree 100%, sounds perfectly reasonable and logical to me.
Chernelle
