Bloomberg Businessweek - USA (2020-08-10)

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BloombergBusinessweek August 10, 2020

for search page ads. “That is driving prices up, up, up, up.”

Prices are a problem. But even more frustrating for Wendler

and other search buyers are the tweaks Google has made in

recent years as it pushes to automate wherever it can. Today

there are two basic ways to buy search ads. A business owner

can pick out search terms manually or take the approach

Google prefers: Hand over a budget, select an industry, and let

Google’s software figure out which ads will get the most clicks.

In Google-ese, these are known as Smart campaigns. The idea

is to make search-ad buying as simple as possible, while Google

uses what it promises is the latest and greatest in machine intel-

ligence to maximize profits for itself and its customers. “Our

advertising tools are designed to help small businesses compete

on a level playing field with large businesses, even Fortune 500

companies,” says a Google spokesman. “Local businesses, even

those without marketing expertise, can create compelling ads

in minutes that reach the right audiences.”

Butautomationdoesn’tworkterriblywellfortherapists.

Manyarespecialists,focusingon,say,couplescounselingor

trauma—distinctions that Google’s software doesn’t necessar-

ily make. As a result, some therapists who use the automated

approach end up entering auctions for broader keywords

where the clicks don’t lead anywhere. For one of Wendler’s cli-

ents, Google’s system once suggested “PTSD,” a search many

people make for idle research rather than to find an expen-

sive counselor. Another client wasted a tenth of his $2,000

monthly Google ads budget this way before Wendler caught

the problem. In another feature, Google even automatically

writes ad copy. “If you’re selling a widget or something, maybe

that works for you,” Wendler says. People are less thrilled

with psychologists who sound like they’ve been programmed.

That hasn’t stopped Google from pushing therapists to adopt

Smart campaigns. Wendler recalls Saturday calls from Google

representatives asking him to turn on automated ads for his cli-

ents.Hepolitelydeclinesandasksthemnottocallagain.They

waitthreemonthsandcallagain.“Googleis essentiallycom-

petingwithitself,”hesays.“IthinkGoogle’sultimate goal is that

yougivethemyourcreditcardandthat’stheonlythingyoudo.”

DATA:

NETMARKETSHARE.COM,

EMARKETER,

SPARKTORO

Global desktop traffic

from search engines

in 2019

Searching Google, for Google

U.S. search ad revenue,

2018

Clicks from U.S. Google

searches, Q1 2019

Other Paidclicksto

non-Google sites 4

Google74%

Bing 11

Baidu 10

Other

Google73%

Amazon 12

Microsoft 7

Noclick49%

Unpaidclicksto

non-Googlesites 41

Googlesites 6

ThecontrolsuchcompaniesasGoogleexertovertheir

markets is one key reason lawmakers are trying to check Big

Tech’s monopoly power. Consider Amazon’s “subscribe & save”

feature, which lets shoppers place a standing order for Raisin

Bran or toilet paper. It’s convenient—and it reduces the incen-

tive to try competitors. “It locks you in,” says Luigi Zingales, a

finance professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of

Business. The same could be said of Google’s Smart campaigns.

But Wendler and other search marketers say Google’s drive

to automate has dovetailed with a reduction in the quality

of customer support. For years a search-ad buyer could call

a Google help line and get someone on the phone. Starting

about two years ago, Google began outsourcing these services,

and, buyers say, the quality of support quickly diminished. “It

feels like you’re speaking to someone who’s just talking out

of a binder,” says Matt Coffman, founder of Therapy Practice

Accelerator, a health-care marketing firm.

During the pandemic, Coffman says, he hasn’t been able to

get a human on the phone at all; Google moved its customer

support to chatbots. The Google spokesman says the company

“scaled back” support services because of Covid-19.

Practically every antitrust investigator who’s looked into

Google has seen a web presentation called “Focus on the

User.” It was created in 2014 by Yelp and TripAdvisor, local

review sites and longtime Google critics whose central com-

plaint was that Google was expanding its ambitions beyond

mere web search in ways that hurt small companies. As rivals

tell it, Google’s search engine once did one thing: Spit out a list

of 10 blue links. But starting in the mid-2000s, search results

began to include, above the links, actual answers to ques-

tions like “How hot is the sun?” and “What are the signs of

heatstroke?”Googlepulledthesefactsfromotherwebsites,

resultinginsearcheswhereconsumersdon’tbotherclicking

onanylinks.Yelpandothers argue this represents a theft

of their intellectual property, siphoning off their web traffic.

Gradually this extended to phrases like “Where is the best

Sichuan food in London?” with the top results from Google

Maps. After Maps, Google did the same with its own services

in travel, hotel booking, and shopping. In each case, Google

says it shows the best results for consumers. Competing busi-

nesses say this is an open-and-shut abuse of monopoly power.

Google has done something similar with health care. At

times the company has seemed intent on capitalizing on

Doctor Google—that ubiquitous modern phenomenon of self-

diagnosis-by-web-search. In 2015, Google teamed up with the

Mayo Clinic to begin listing symptoms and treatments directly

in search results rather than showing web links. At that point,

Google said 1 in 20 searches were health-related.

Abouttwoyearsago,thecompanyhiredDavidFeinberg,a

hospitalexecutiveandformerpsychiatrist,toleada newdivi-

sion,GoogleHealth.Feinberg’sremitis tocreateanelectronic

medicalrecordssystemforhospitalsthatfunctions like Google

search and to help revamp Google searches about health. His

division created a special search page for anything related