In recent weeks, several client accounts have been falsely identified as selling counterfeit products and have been unable to display ads, according to two Google advertising agencies for retailers.
Vic Drabicky, CEO of January Digital, recently revealed that one of his clients, a major luxury retailer, was hit with an ad pause of about 14 hours, which cost him about $150,000. 20 million yen, 1 dollar = 134 yen conversion) lost revenue. Another agency executive said a department store client was unable to advertise for 18 hours in late March, losing 80-90% of its web traffic for the day.
A matter of life and death for retailers
Both agencies explained that it all started when a client was falsely identified as selling counterfeit goods and had their Google Merchant Center (GMC) account suspended.
GMC is widely used by retailers, where products can be uploaded to appear in Google search results and shopping sections. GMC is a key driver of sales because it helps consumers find products.
When Insider reached out to a Google spokesperson, the company said in an email that it uses a combination of human checks and AI to detect violations.
“Excessive verdicts can occur for a variety of reasons. No system is perfect, so we allow advertisers to challenge verdicts at any time. We will never hesitate to overturn the judgment, if any.”
Dravicky credits Google for fixing the error in just one day. Google normally warns retailers that problems can take up to five days to resolve.
Stops all ads when false positives are made
But the issue highlights the risks faced by online merchants who tie their products to Google ads. When Google flags one of a retailer’s products as fake, it automatically stops advertising for that retailer across all of its platforms, including YouTube, search, display ads and shopping ads. Executives at two agencies we spoke with said Google Ads has significantly boosted web traffic and sales for retailers.
Google said it didn’t explain why it flagged it as a fake, but agency executives suspect it’s because GMC works with a feature called P-MAX (Performance Max). P-MAX is a function that can automatically distribute and manage all Google ad spaces in one campaign.
A Google spokesperson said the company’s policy center and rating system operates across all of its advertising products, not just P-MAX.
The suspension of ads could continue to wreak havoc even after account reactivation.
January Digital said it was able to resume the campaign the same day the account was reactivated, but another agency executive said, “It took a while to restore the main campaign. We got back to almost full capacity in 2019,” he said.
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(Edited by Ayuko Tokiwa)
Source: BusinessInsider
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