As the world's largest search engine, Google takes the title of the largest advertiser, with brands paying to have products served at the top of its results. Now, it appears it is using this status to promote its own goods at the detriment of these so-called clients.
A report in the Wall Street Journal reveals Google is the biggest buyer of its own ads, using the service to prioritise its Google Pixel, Nest smart thermostats and its music service.
Analysis last year, by search-ad-data firm SEMrush, found that ads for products sold by Google and other companies owned by Alphabet appeared in the top spot in 91 per cent of 25,000 recent searches related to such items.
A Google search for “phones” almost always started with three consecutive ads for the Pixel. Out of 1,000 searches for “laptops”, every one started with an ad for the Chromebook. This was similar for watch searches, which started with an Android smartwatch ad 98 per cent of the time.
Google’s advertising space works via auctions for each search result, during which marketers bid for terms. According to the WSJ, Google determines ad placements and prices based on a “secret algorithm” and Google’s assessment of an ad’s quality and relevance, taking into account past click rate and the marketer’s landing page.
When asked, Google said its participation in this bidding doesn’t directly inflate prices. It also said its ads only appear on top of the search results because of the ad’s quality and the prices Google is willing to pay, which is subject to in-house marketing budgets.
When the WSJ showed the analysis to Google in December, many of the ads later disappeared, including nearly all ads from its online store on December 15. A week later, on December 22, Google and Nest ads were in the top 19 per cent of searches. Google reportedly declined to comment on this decline and WIRED has contacted the company for further information.
Facebook and Microsoft bid on their own ads on their respective platforms, but it doesn’t appear, at this stage, that either have been flooding their own advertising spaces to such an extent as Google appeared to.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
