Got email from google that 'home' is trademarked

They don't like the word 'home' in my ad?

[ari11210]

I have had an ad running for a few months now without any problem. Today I received an email from google saying that my ad was suspended for trademark reasons. They said the word 'home' in my ad was infringing on a trademark. This is obviously wrong (I hope) and there are no other words in my ad that might have trademark issues. Does anyone know why I would get an email like this? For now I changed it to 'house' in my ad.
Thanks
Art

[Eurydice]

A client has the same situation: Google says "housing" is trademarked.

"Home" and "housing" can't be trademarked. This would end "home for sale" signs.

If you search, there are plenty of ads that still use these words.

Apparently someone at Google made a mistake.

[dooglebug]

Perhaps you are competing with a Google insider?

As AWA confirmed recently [webmasterworld.com] (post #19):

By policy, AdWords employees may certainly have AdWords accounts.

[Oshburg]

Just wanted to jump in and say I received the same message when I tried to use a phrase that had the word "housing" in it. I don't know how you could trademark the terms housing and house.

[eWhisper]

When you see in your campaign that Google has disapproved a word, you can always request an exception. Usually exception request like this are approved pretty quickly.

[webaddict]

I used to work in the real estate industry with AdWords quite heavily and never had this problem. However, this was before the *new* system. I will check with some of my old accounts and see if they are having the same problem.

Regardless, I would take eWhisper's advice and just request an exception. I have never had a requested exception be turned down and it's immediately approved.

[sailorjwd]

I've been using home, house in my ads for many months with no problem. I guess you are a special case :)

maybe I should check my email spam bucket.

Or maybe it has to be in a certain context?

[porieux]

I don't see how trademarks would be relevant to a text ad.

[andrea99]

You don't say (and maybe you can't) what the other context might be. Probably "Home" is a trademark in connection with some other product or company that you are advertising. Though as a hypothetical it does seem unlikely that Lowe's would be forbidden from using the word "home" just because their main competitor is Home Depot. The word is so generic, it applies to half the products and services we use.

[ari11210]

The end of the story is... I sent an email to google saying that they musy have been mistaken, and they responded that they indeed were wrong, and they re-approved the ad. Must have been a glitch in their system.
Thanks