I wonder if it is simply Eric Schmidt's ties to Google preventing a DOJ anti-trust suit. Owning the largest advertisment platform, owning the advertising adjacencies, and using that leverage against your competition is very much rubbing up against illegal use of a monopolistic position.
Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
21–30 of 38 posts
Re: Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
#22payback time!
Re: Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
#23The article is a second-hand account of a discussion with a low-level call center employee. I hardly think we should extrapolate Google's corporate policy from this account.
Interesting to note the parallel with the post which claimed Facebook was blocking G+ ads a few weeks ago. Many jumped to conclusions, bit in the discussion on HN [http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2770237], it was determined this was more likely a trademark issue than a competitive action.
Don't jump to conclusions.
Re: Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
#24Google "Facebook ads" and check out the Adwords ads. Facebook themselves advertise directly via Adwords. I'm going to transcribe myself talking to a brain-dead call centre rep about alien life and give it a catchy article headline to complete the troll.
Re: Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
#25One potential reason for this: http://www.byrnehobart.com/blog/a-clever-adwords-hack-how-to... When people run ads pointing to a site they don't own, it's often in an effort to get an implicit endorsement from that site. Note: I have no evidence that this is going on, but it is a risk with any site that has a recognizable URL and allows user-generated content. From what I can see, it looks like ads pointing to FB wer…
> These ads are also growing in popularity. It looks like they doubled between April and June. Source?
I buy lots of data sets on this stuff. My company analyzes SEO and SEM campaigns to help investors understand what they're getting into.
Re: Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
#26Before we jump to conclusions, it's equally possible Facebook is behind this. Google gets lots of nastygrams from companies who view ads containing their name as trademark violations. A few years ago I had trouble running an iPod related ad on Google, not because of Google but because of Apple. Is there any indication this is Google and not Facebook's doing?
Interestingly, a search for "find friends" on Google still returns an ad promoting Facebook from Facebook itself. That's one data point in favor of the Facebook-initiated trademark hypothesis.
Screenshot? I see FB as the top organic result, but not as an advertiser.
Re: Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
#27Anyone with a US legal background know if this raises any antitrust issues? It would certainly raise some red flags under Australian competition law.
IANAL, but in the US whether you actually hold a monopoly is the key. I think it would be bough to show that Google holds a monopoly in this space. They definitely command the biggest market share, but I'm not sure it would be enough to show that they have a monopoly. 65% (as reported here: http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2011/02/11/googles-lead-s...) is certainly the lion's share, but not quite a monopoly by US standards.
Re: Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
#28Google recently suspended all my ads for advertising services (AdWords competitors) and for ad tracking services (Analytics competitors). These are sites Google had advertised for as long as 6 years without issue. The reasons all seem a stretch ( http://www.w3roi.com is suspended for 'misleading claims' - what claims?). Someone's rewriting policies and cracking down over there, and it's a big problem for any business…
This is why you don't stake the well-being of your company on the good intentions of another's.
Google controls something like 97% of search traffic.
if you aren't with them, you essentially get knee capped
Re: Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
#29Anyone with a US legal background know if this raises any antitrust issues? It would certainly raise some red flags under Australian competition law.
IANAL, but in the US whether you actually hold a monopoly is the key. I think it would be bough to show that Google holds a monopoly in this space. They definitely command the biggest market share, but I'm not sure it would be enough to show that they have a monopoly. 65% (as reported here: http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2011/02/11/googles-lead-s... ) is certainly the lion's share, but not quite a monopoly by US…
it's in google's best interest to get studies to show them with lower market share. I'd bet if you tallied up the stats for 100 biggest sites, Google would have at least 90, if not 95% of all search engine traffic
Re: Google Bans Adwords use for Facebook
#30http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8...
"Facebook Blog" is still showing me AdWords ads for Facebook Advertising. (facebook.com/ads/)