Top > Business > 2006 > September > 2006-09-03

Anti-Google Expert Claims Google Hurting Businesses

The Google Adwords system has been the most effective pay-per-click advertising network since the day they began in 2000, says Landing Page Conversion Expert Mark Widawer. "But the new Google Adwords policy change has resulted in an increase in the Cost Per Click - that`s the amount an advertiser pays when someone clicks on one of their ads - sometimes from nickels and dimes to $5, $10 or more."

Apparently, this was Google`s goal from the start: raising the price of a click for advertisers, whose websites provided a "low-quality" experience for users. This was expected to be a technique that would effectively raise the quality of Google`s overall paid search results. "But Google doesn`t reveal a step-by-step guide to achieve their definition of quality," claims Widawer. "This leaves many legitimate small business owners forced to either pay one hundred times more for a website visitor, or to abandon Google Adwords and look to other traffic sources."

Widawer discovered the 6-step "Recipe" that makes websites "delicious" to Google, consistent with the new Google Adwords policy. As Widawer said "I don`t know any legitimate small business that can withstand an increase in customer acquisition costs of 100 times or more, so I tested what Google really means when they speak about `Quality`." Google and online merchant eBay recently inked a deal to enable click-and-call technology for customers to more easily reach business owners.