Possible publisher implications with AdWords site exclusion changes

September 24, 2005

What the AdWords site exclusion tool allows advertisers to do is block specific content network sites from showing their ads. Previously, advertisers could only block 25 URLs per campaign, but it has just been bumped up to 500 sites.

When this feature initially launched, the likely targeted URLs would be scraper or obvious “made for AdSense” sites. Quality content sites probably wouldn’t have seen an impact, unless it was simply advertisers blocking their ads from showing on competitive sites or their own network of sites. But with 500 URLs per campaign, advertisers could get down into the nitty gritty of ROI and block all publisher sites that they feel are underperforming in terms of ROI.

On the flip side, with this much more control over where their ads are appearing, this could result in more advertisers choosing to opt into the content network.

It will be interesting to watch and see how this change impacts publishers.

From an advertiser’s viewpoint, this is a really good change and gives advertisers a lot more control to decide whether they want their ads on certain sites.

From a publisher’s viewpoint - this could mean more money for “quality” sites, but it could definitely impact the bottom line of “sub quality” sites.

AdWords bumped up the limit on the number of content network site URLs you can filter from 25 up to 500 - if you add a site URL to an ad campaign using the site exclusion filter tool, your ads will not appear on that URL. I often heard complaints from advertisers who felt they would have opted into the content network if that limit was a lot higher than 25, and jumping up to 500 should make a huge differemce.

I beta tested this tool before it was officially released, and I felt 25 URLs per campaign was too low. In the end though, even after going through a couple weeks of logs and tracking ROI, I ended up not needing more than the 25.

But many advertisers do not want their ads showing on any scraper site period, so having the increased 500 URL limit will make it easier for advertisers. Rather than having to “pick and choose” which would make the “top 25″ list of URLs to block, I would bet most advertisers won’t take the time or effort to find 500 content network site URLs to filter out.

I was a little disappointed to see that you still cannot block URLs from all campaigns at once. If you have a site you don’t want any of your ads showing on, you need to add that site manually to every campaign.

You won’t be able to access the tool unless you are opted into the content network.

More about the site exclusion tool:
https://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=13248?ctx=awblog&sourceid=awo&subid=US-ET-AWB-092105_1

Author: Jenstar
Site: WebmasterWorld.com