The Result of Google's Right Hand Side Ad Removal

What effect has Google's removal of advertising from the right hand side of its search results pages had on campaign spend and performance? There's quite a bit of data floating around that examines the development. 

 


 SUBSCRIBE to Website Magazine & Accelerate 'Net Success


Kenshoo, for example, published results from research it conducted over the week following the Google change, finding a small (one percent) decrease in CPC (cost per click), and on the whole, week-over-week changes to click and spend volume were within normal weekly variance, with a small increase in clicks and a smaller increase in spending due to the drop in average cost per click (CPC). 

 

Another study from Accuracast found that the click-through rate has increased on paid search results at the top of the results. Accuracast's data shows a large increase of 18.2 percent for ads in position 4, and increases for position 1 and 2 of 8.4 percent & 7.7 percent, respectively as well. The only ad position where the CTR dropped after the change was position 3.