In 2017, Google announced the Ad Experience Report in Search Console. I remember the announcement like it was yesterday. The overall idea was brilliant. Provide a series of reports that inform website owners when their advertising situation has resulted in a poor user experience. And they also announced that if a site failed a review, Chrome would no longer serve ads for the site. It was clearlyand I really liked the one from Google.
That was something that was so necessary it wasn’t even funny.
Why? I’ve long documented how aggressive, intrusive, or misleading advertising can be seriously problematic from the perspective of major algorithm updates (with an emphasis on major core updates). I’ve documented where Google has explained this over the years, I’ve provided case studies, I’ve explained the context of Navboost, and more.
This is what the report looks like in GSC:
As for Google’s warnings about aggressive and intrusive advertising, Google’s quality rating guidelines contained information about Google’s aggressive ads Blog post about major core updates explains more about the aggressiveness of ads and Helpful content documentation from Google covers aggressive and disruptive advertising.
Additionally, Google’s Elizabeth Tucker explained in her post about the March core update that Google has refined its systems to better understand whether web pages contained unhelpful content, had a bad user experienceetc. And even the Chrome team covered the topic by publishing a post on the Chrome developer blog It explained how to run ads without impacting the user experience. And that was very interesting timing considering the HCU(X) literally just launched in September and poor UX played a role in that update…
Enforcement begins:
Back to 2017…Google announced that it would provide a report in the GSC that would notify site owners if their ad situation failed a review based on Better advertising standards. I couldn’t wait to jump into it, especially considering how many sites had reached out to me after being hit hard by major core updates where aggressive and intrusive advertising was part of the equation.
Google began enforcing violations in February 2018 and I immediately began analyzing the situation. By the way: If a website has not passed the advertising friendliness check, all ads would be removed from the website in Chrome. Yes, no advertising for you. I loved this idea. What an incredible way to get website owners to mitigate the ad situation. I documented how this worked in several blog posts in 2018 (both on my website and on Search Engine Roundtable).
Sites that violate the Better Ads Standards actually had their ads removed in Chrome. It was wild to see, even though only the worst of the worst situations were affected. For example, here are some screenshots of removed ads:
“Mountain View, we have a problem…” Great concept, but it never told the whole story (aggressive advertising).
Over time, I quickly noticed problems with the way the system worked. Firstly, the ad situation would be based only on the basis Better advertising standards. The standards cover the worst ad formats you can imagine. For example, auto-playing video ads with sound, large sticky ads, flashing animated ads, full-screen rollover ads, and more. Don’t get me wrong, these are terrible formats, but still, sites that pass verification have way too many ads on a page, ads that still annoy users, layered ads, and more. Based on what I saw, only the worst of the worst was enforced. And that gave website owners a false sense of security. I’ll share more about it soon.
Here are some of the formats covered by the Better Ads Standards:
In other words, websites could still exist algorithmic influenced based on the contribution of aggressive advertising and poor UX situations that go beyond what the Better Ads Standards cover. So the Ad Experience report delivered a serious message false sense of security for website owners. Note that I said “contribution” to algorithmic influence above. That’s because Google evaluates many factors with major core updates. There is never a smoking gun. Usually there is a battery of it.
Second, there were many, many sites that had done this has never been checked in search console. And if a site wasn’t verified, it couldn’t fail the verification and enforcement could never happen. As a result, ads continued to appear on sites that either violated the Better Ads Standards or simply had a terrible ad situation without violating the Better Ads Standards. This also gave website owners a false sense of security when it came to major algorithm updates such as major core updates.
As a quick example, here is the Ad Experience Report for two sites affected by September’s Helpful Content Update (HCUX), where I believe very aggressive ads absolutely contributed to the classifier’s application. A website has never been verified. So the website owner could mistakenly believe that everything was fine from an advertising perspective. If there had been an early warning sign in the GSC, the site owner might have been able to tone things down.
Below it says one passes the exam and the other was never graded.
Third, and this is pretty obvious, the report is now in the Legacy Tools and Reports menu in GSC. This is not a good sign and may become outdated at some point. So the whole situation could be in motion opposite direction where it should go from! That means Google may provide site owners with less information about their ad situation rather than more…
However, I exported the latest list of violating sites via the Ad Experience API and there have still been recent enforcement actions. For example, you can see enforcement for multiple locations begin in March and then May 2024.
The “But we pass…” argument and a HUGE false sense of security.
Even today, when I explain to site owners that their ad situation is likely contributing to their decline due to major core updates (or other algorithm updates), some come back and say, “But the Ad Experience Report in GSC says our ads are fine!” ” Ugh, then I have to explain everything I explained here in this post. For example, Google’s review is based solely on the Better Ads Standards and does not cover many aggressive, disruptive or misleading advertising situations on the web.
In a strange twist, the report intended to help website owners curb aggressive advertising actually gives them a false sense of security and encourages more aggressive advertising.
For example, in recent talks on major algorithm updates, I’ve shown two different ad situations to explain what aggressive and disruptive ads look like. Based on Better Ads Standards, both sites either passed a review or were not reviewed at all.
Here is one of the slides from my deck. Go ahead and try to find the content:
What the Ad Experience Report could have looked like (or what it might still look like):
Based on the latest antitrust case against Google, we learned more about Navboost. This is an important system that Google uses to track user engagement signals over a 13-month period, which can impact rankings. I wrote more about this in my post about “high visibility AND low quality” and why that is an extremely dangerous combination.
Imagine if Google could provide some warning signals in GSC when user satisfaction drops based on Navboost data. Google would help website owners help themselves and avoid disaster from major algorithm updates. As Google has explained, “quality” is not just about content. It’s about the user experience, the ad situation, the way things are presented, and more.
Here’s another great slide about Navboost from the Google antitrust case:
And here is a slide from one of my presentations with John Mueller’s comments about how “quality” means more than just content. Note that he specifically says “UX issues” and “on-page ads.”
Therefore, Navboost would need to have a threshold that could trigger an alert in GSC in Ad Experience Reporting (or change the name to User Experience Report instead).
But that poses a big problem for people trying to outsmart Google…
Unfortunately, spammers are the reason we can’t have nice things. If there was a Navboost threshold that site owners could understand, spammers could test how close they can get to the “danger line” without being affected. And then that could lead to many sites pushing the boundaries of the web with aggressive ads, aggressive affiliate setups, greedy UX, and more.
By the way, this is also the reason why we don’t get all inbound links in GSC, why there are nofollowed links there, why we can’t export all pages from coverage reporting, and more. Google cannot provide too much data, otherwise the data could be misused by spammers.
That’s why I think it will be very difficult for Google to tell site owners that users are not happy (short of releasing a major update and causing a page drop). Google can provide hints and hints anywhere (which they already do), but I highly doubt they will provide concrete data in GSC that ads are a problem (or that Navboost data signals big problems from a user experience perspective).
If I just think about it out loud, maybe Google could do all of them one day
Moving on: It was a good concept, but it’s not effective.
When you get right to the point, you can’t rely on the Ad Experience Report in GSC to let you know when your ad situation is too aggressive, disruptive, or misleading. It just highlights the worst of the worst, and that’s it IF Your website will even be checked. Again, most are not rated.
However, that doesn’t mean you should ignore user frustration and dissatisfaction. In my posts and presentations about major core updates, I have always said: “Hell hath no fury like a user scorned.” If you bombard users with aggressive, intrusive or misleading advertising, You’ll find out if that results in a terrible user experience at scale. It is called a comprehensive core update. And remember: there is never a unique selling point with comprehensive core updates. Google evaluates many factors using machine learning. But the advertising situation, and what that means for the user experienceis absolutely a factor.
Just think of Navboost… It’s an important system that tracks user engagement signals for 13 months and can impact rankings. This is a great way for Google to understand a growing and creeping ad experience problem. And if you tip the scale the wrong way, be careful.
User Studies: A Google Early Warning System for Tsunami Detection.
People ask me all the time how to figure out if aggressive advertising is a problem. Well, you can get early warning signals before a Google tsunami hits us by conducting user studies through the lens of comprehensive core updates. This is a great way to understand how objective third-party users think about your website, your content, user experience, ADVERTISING EXPERIENCE and more. For more information about the power of user studies, see my post on the topic. The great thing about it is that you can set it up quickly and get important feedback.
Unfortunately, many website owners love the idea of doing this, but most don’t do the studies. I just covered this in my latest SMX presentation. It’s insane. So just set up the study and run it. The results could be revealing.
Summary: Yes, aggressive, disruptive, and misleading ads can cause SEO problems.
But no, the Ad Experience Report in its current form doesn’t really help most website owners understand when they’re dangerously on the edge… Every website is different, there are many signals that are evaluated by Google with comprehensive core updates and Navboost continuously measures user satisfaction (with Google tracking user interaction data for 13 months). Ignore these signals at your own risk. And again, have your team conduct a user study Now to find out what real people think about your website, your content, your ads, your UX and more. The results could drive change. And change could be exactly what your website needs.
GG