Google allows trademark keyword bidding in the UK - the beginning of the end for PPC?
What is it?
It's essentially Audi advertising their cars by bidding on BMW keywords; so if I search for "new BMW M3", Audi's results can appear in the sponsored results bit of Google. So this means that if I start my own computer shop, I can try to steal Dell's business by bidding on the "Dell" keyword.
This is bad for affiliates
You'd be forgiven for thinking that affiliates will be loving this; but the reality is that 90% of proper affiliate schemes have terms and conditions applied to them that state you cannot display the advert as a result based on searches on their trademark. So for Dell it means I cannot show my result if the user searches for "Dell". However Google changing their policy means that I *could* if Dell would let me. Which they won't.
Therefore affiliates are in the same boat they were always in; but individual shops with an Internet presence will do better because they can piggy-back off the popularity of bigger brands. Therefore if I started "Seopher Computers" I could genuinely bid against "Dell" and "Packard Bell" to promote my own brand.
This is bad for the brand-owners
Okay so imagine I own Dell. Currently I can buy Dell keywords for next-to-nothing (as I'm the only person who can) - so it's a tiny CPC but great click throughs and conversions. What happens when anyone else can bid for them? Suddenly my own trademark becomes competitive and lucrative by extension.
What are they doing? Are they trying to push people to natural search? I assume not considering how much money Adwords makes them, but I can't see a real reason for doing so otherwise. It just looks like Google is trying to kill PPC... Check out the original story in NMA.
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