Safety is a Crucial, Unpredictable Google Filter for Advertisers

Safety, security, and privacy remain a high priority for Google. Recently, Google released their Ads Safety Report, noting a tremendous number of blocked ads in 2020. Google blocked a total of 3.1 billion ads, restricted over 6.4 billion ads, and suspended 1.7 million advertisers.

2020 was an intense year that surfaced an array of highly sensitive issues, from COVID-19 to the presidential election to the movement for Black lives. Some experts believe that this sharp increase in blocked and restricted ads reflects contention among the population. Blocking ads, for Google, is a way of mitigating misinformation, controversy, and online disputes. Within the larger sum, 99 million of the ads that Google blocked had to do with COVID. Several million political ads were also blocked.

For marketers, this oversight is largely a good thing. After all, most of the blocked ads were likely created by spam advertisers, publishers releasing sexual content or troll-like online behavior. Recently, I wrote about the need for compliance & protection to ensure that brands don’t get lost by the algorithm. If you are looking for strategies to navigate the complexities of SEO, consider working with ASTRALCOM.