In August of 2018 David Graff, Director, Global Product Policy issued the following policy.
Today, we’re taking another step. We’ve seen a rise in misleading ad experiences stemming from third-party technical support providers and have decided to begin restricting ads in this category globally. For many years, we’ve consulted and worked with law enforcement and government agencies to address abuse in this area. As the fraudulent activity takes place off our platform, it’s increasingly difficult to separate the bad actors from the legitimate providers. That’s why in the coming months, we will roll out a verification program to ensure that only legitimate providers of third-party tech support can use our platform to reach consumers.
These efforts alone won’t stop all bad actors trying to game our advertising systems, but it will make it a lot harder. There’s more to do, and we’ll continue committing the resources necessary to keep the online advertising ecosystem a safe place for everyone.
Shortly after this policy was issued I called into Google support to talk to an ads specialist to find out how and when I could go through the validation process.
The response was that I would have to sit and wait because there was no one to talk to.
Two hours later all of my ads were discontinued.
Guess I should have kept my mouth shut.
Realizing that Google pay per click is the most effective way to advertise and that they have a 75% market share, I instantly knew that if I didn’t find a resolution soon, this policy would destroy my business.
I started searching for David Graff and found him on Linkedin. Here is the email I sent.
David,
My name is Brad Coulter. My son and I own a small computer repair shop in south New Jersey. We have been servicing this community for 16 years. Apparently we have been included in this third party tech support service restriction. Bottom line is that this is going to put us out of business before the end of the year. I can’t even imagine how many other small computer repair stores will suffer the same cost. At 64 years old it just might be a little difficult for me in the normal job market.
The restrictions to our PPC account has been severe and is having a devastating effect on the bottom line.
Our Key Performance Metrics are in the dirt and our gross sales have gone from $30,000 to $25,000 to $21,000 to $17,000 over the last 4 months.
Our PPC spend has gone from $2500 to under $1,000 and CPA from $2.50/$3.50 to $6.00/$10.00 because of the increase competition.
Google is a Monopoly in the PPC market and there is no other place to go. Our future rests in your hands.
Is there any way to get a rider. We will give you any information you require to get back on track. If that isn’t possible could you please provide any information on the time frame of the new validation process.
Google assures us that this is a temporary hiatus.
In their announcement, they assure their advertisers:
In the coming months, we’ll develop a verification program to ensure that only legitimate providers of third-party technical support have access to our platform.
In the past, Google has introduced similar restrictions and verification processes for other industries it saw abusing its ad networks.
In September 2017, Google restricted ads for rehab services and later enabled them to resume advertising after a vetting process in July 2018.
In the tech services we are now approaching the 1 year mark.
No business can succeed or even stay alive with only 50% of their income.
I just can’t believe they couldn’t notify their paying customers, via the dashboard in Google ads.
However, they are quick to send ‘recommendations’ on a daily basis to try get a higher spend out of you.
Yet a simple message sent to users say, 3 months before the policy kicked in couldn’t be done.
Do they not realize there are possibly millions of legitimate computer/tech business worldwide that will have their livelihood affected?
It would be different if Google didn’t have a monopoly on search, people would have a choice.
It just screams bad business practice and customer service.
I called Google Ad support 3 times and they were clueless.
They didn’t know about this policy change either.
And 2 of the support advisors actually tried to get me to change bid amounts and from manual to automated bidding.
Unreal.
I explained it wasn’t just my ads that weren’t showing but what looked like the whole country.
Fell on deaf ears.
If I had the resources I certainly would explore a class action suit.
This monopoly needs to be rained in!