Search ads and the importance of landing page navigation
We think a lot about how and when ads can appear in Search. Our goal is to show you the most helpful and relevant ads, which is why we look at a variety of signals when determining what ads you see. Today, we’re sharing an example of how we recently refined our ads quality systems to better understand people’s intent and expectations as we continue to create more helpful ads experiences on Search.
Have you ever clicked on a link and ended up not quite where you expected, and with no easy way to find what you need? It can be frustrating to click on a Search ad and land on a page that doesn’t match what you were looking for and is hard to use. This means landing pages must be both relevant and easy to navigate — otherwise, people spend more time than they want to bouncing between search results and landing pages.
For instance, if you click on an ad looking for a login page, but land on a promotion instead, a good experience depends on how quickly you can find the login page from there. If it’s not easily accessible you'll probably return to Google Search to try again, and that’s not time well spent.
User looking for a login page clicks on a Search ad that leads to a promotion
User is unable to find the login page from the promotion page
User returns to the Google Search results to find the login page
To help address this problem, we recently developed a new prediction model that helps our ads quality systems more precisely capture the quality of your navigation experience when visiting a Search ad’s landing page. We’ve improved our ability to understand and predict if a Search ad leads to an unexpected destination and doesn’t offer other helpful navigation options. As a result, we're now able to show you fewer ads like this, reducing these types of negative experiences for people searching on Google.
User looking for a login page clicks on a Search ad that leads to a promotion
User sees the promotion but is easily able to find a link to the login page
User gets to the login page easily from the promotion page
While landing page content has always been a key aspect we look at, this update emphasizes the importance of relevant content and easy-to-navigate landing pages. These changes will improve your Search experience by making it easier for you to find the information you’re looking for — and help drive long-term value to advertisers.
If you are an advertiser, and your landing pages are not currently navigable, we recommend improving navigation on your site to enable people to get where they want to go.
As Search continues to evolve, we will continue to make changes to our ads quality systems to improve the Google Search ads experience.
