During a discussion with a colleague this morning about Google Adwords and general search marketing topics, we came across an interesting discovery that I haven’t seen talked about much in the past few weeks. If you’ve performed a search on Google lately, you most likely haven’t noticed that the yellow box around sponsored results is no longer visible, what you also may or may not have noticed is a small yellow icon that says “ad” next to sponsored results.
As I looked into this new discovery a bit more, I noticed that the faint yellow background that I’m familiar with on Google’s search results pages had been replaced by an almost unnoticeable pale white background. The yellow color that used to seperate paid listings from organic results has been replaced with a color that most people likely can’t even see on a generic monitor, a lovely shade of #FFF7ED. Even with the ridiculously high definition monitor I use in my office, I was barely able to see the difference. If not for Photoshop and Chrome’s inspect element feature, I never would have been able to prove to myself that I was seeing two colors.
Can you see the difference? Black line added to help you see the color difference (not actually shown on Google Results).[/caption]
Google is Apparently Doing Some Test Runs
Of course, after seeing this change happen so suddenly (who knows, it could have been this way for months and we never noticed), I was curious to see if anyone else has seen this change or anything close to it. As we dug around, we came across an article posted a few days ago about Google’s Yellow Ads Label by Jennifer Slegg on SearchEngineWatch.com discussing a new sponsored listings notifier that is being tested. The first thing I thought was “oh look, Google’s taking a page from Bing’s handbook.” Little did I know, that in the 67 years since I last used Bing, they no longer have any noticeable difference between their paid and organic results aside from a small “ads related to…” line above their ads.
Jennifer’s results for “Black Friday”[/caption]
When Jennifer noticed the difference in Google’s sponsored listings, she came across a small yellow icon with the word “Ad” displayed next to each search result. When I did the same search, I came across no yellow icons. Between my own results and her article, I can only conclude that Google is running some behind-the-scenes tests on their sponsored results to figure out a new way to serve people ads. She mentions in her article that it seems that the tests may be exclusive to the Chrome browser. I ran the same searches using both Chrome and Firefox, and noticed no difference between either browser as far as the way sponsored results are displayed.
My search on Google for “Black Friday”[/caption]
Google Seems to Be Seeking Higher Profits from Paid Search Results
The more and more I look into this, I can’t help but come to one single conclusion: Google is trying to line their pockets by producing more clicks. As an advertiser, I both hate and love this possibility. Personally, I have always had a tendency to follow organic results as opposed to sponsored results, simply because I trust them more for most of the searches that I do. With organic and sponsored results looking exactly the same to the untrained eye, I can’t help but think that I would see an increase in traffic as a result of this subtle change. That’s a major benefit to advertisers, right?
On the other hand, I can’t help but imagine a world where the consumer gets the raw end of the deal. One of the biggest benefits to Google for consumers has long been the ability to differentiate from organic and sponsored search results. It provided the opportunity for consumers to be fully aware that they were receiving a sales pitch at the top of the page, and if that pitch wasn’t good enough, they trusted the organic results enough to provide them with a solution to their query. With the fine line being removed, I can’t help but worry that with the right dollar amount, the wrong products will end up in front of consumers, leading them to results that they weren’t interested in but clicked thinking it was a natural result of their search. The display notates that you’re being shown ads, but with no visible barrier between organic and sponsored listings (and no indication of how many ads are actually being shown) there is no real way of knowing what you’re getting yourself into without clicking through. I imagine that consumers will eventually grow tired of seeing these results, and may start to lose faith in the results their receiving.
I’m curious to see what the end result of this apparent trial/error will be, but for the moment I’m a bit discouraged by Google’s methods. They have made constant changes over the years with the way they serve ads to the public. The question that has to be asked in the end, is as advertisers and consumers, what would we like to see in our search results?
Have you noticed any changes to the way Google displays sponsored results? Are you pleased/displeased with the new look and feel? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment below!
Blurred Lines for Sponsored Ads: The New Google Search Results
