Overcoming a Quality Score Slap Sean Marshall Director SEM, PPC Associates

Quality Score Slaps 101

What is a Quality Score Slap?  Advertiser is banned from AdWords due to either manual review or automated analysis  Includes all accounts linked to “bad account” and potentially IP addresses too

How Do You Know You’ve Been Slapped?  from Google telling you  QS of 1s across the board  Can’t get clicks on your account  Having some ad text disapproved or a few keywords with QS 1 is not a slap!  A decline in traffic is not a slap, unless the decline goes to 1 or 0 clicks a day

Reasons for Slaps, #1: Categorization Sources: answer.py?hl=en&answer=66238; atic.py?hl=en&guide=28439&topic=30210&pa ge=guide.cs&answer= answer.py?hl=en&answer= atic.py?hl=en&guide=28439&topic=30210&pa ge=guide.cs&answer=190447

Reasons for Slaps, #2: Multiple Violations of Ts & Cs

Reasons for Slaps, #3: Egregious One-Time Violation Sources: &guide=28446&page=guide.cs &guide=28446&page=guide.cs

Reasons for Slaps, #4: Error by Google  Miscategorized?  Site outage?  Phone number?!!!

Overcoming a Slap

Step 1: Figure out the problem  Talk to your Google rep – they have a tool!  No rep? Call Google customer support or find someone with a rep

Step 2: Start Your Investigation  Who is responsible? Are they still at your company?  Was it a mistake or intentional?  Has it been corrected?  How do you know it won’t happen again?

Step 3: Prepare Your Case – Summary of Potential Arguments  Unique  Relevant  Legitimate  Lucrative  Reformed

Uniqueness Arguments  We were one of the first companies in this space  We are the only company to offer 24/7 customer support  Every product on our site is tested by experts

Relevancy Arguments  We buy keywords like “widget” and “blue widget” because we sell these items  We have more than 50 AdWords landing pages tailored to specific ad groups  Ad groups have specific ad text  Most keywords have a QS of >7 ImageSource: eadis jpg eadis jpg

Legitimacy Arguments  We have raised X millions of dollars  We have served more than 500,000 customers.  We have an A+ rating from the BBB  We’ve been in business since 1995  We won six Webbys

Lucrative Arguments  In the last year, we’ve spend $XXX,XXX on Google AdWords  Our financial plan calls for an increase of X% in this budget for FY 2011  Our market is growing by X% a year ImageSource: resolution-for-ad-agencies-understand-the-google/ resolution-for-ad-agencies-understand-the-google/

Reformed Arguments  We have put mechanisms in place to make sure this won’t happen again  The guy who did this was fired  We will strive to far exceed minimum AdWords compliance standards

Step 4: Submit Request Re- Instatement  Be polite not combative  Don’t talk about the competition  Ask your rep to personally plead your case (office hours?)  Be prepared to follow through on promises immediately  Follow up until you get an answer

Thank You!   (PPC agency)  (PPC blog)