John McCain, Google and the politics of advertising, Part 2

In John McCain, Google and the politics of advertising, Part 1, I explained how web crawlers work, why they like sites created with Drupal and how Google, the world's largest search engine, has not just successfully married web crawling with contextual advertising, but has become the de facto operating system for all online propaganda campaigns, including politics.

In this second part, I'll try to explain why McCain's ad keeps popping on our site.

So back to the McCain ad.

GoogleAdwords is a contextual advertising network. What this means is that Google uses their search technology to find through all it's publishers the best ad real estate for their clients. This is what Google has to say about the program (emphasis mine):

AdWords lets you create simple, effective ads and display them to people already searching online for information related to your business. So how is it possible to show your ads only to the most relevant audiences? The answer is keyword-based advertising.

When a searcher visits Google and enters a query — say, 'good beginner guitars' — Google will display a variety of relevant search results, such as links to articles containing guitar purchasing advice, or websites dedicated to novice musicians. It will also display AdWords ads that link to online businesses selling guitars, music lessons, or other products and services related to the query.

Given we have an easily searchable, keyword rich site, this means the McCain people must have bought a lot of keywords that have to do with elections, politics and the man himself. Now, the big question is : why would it appear on my personal page as well as the politics sites?

Well, I took a hard look at the page and found that my bio page was mis-categorized. I had 2006 Elections mistakenly as the category for that page. Once I changed that category, this is what happened :

The McCain ads are gone.

Now, you may ask, can't I just block the ads out? Yes, I can.

Here's why I haven't yet : It all has to do with Google's own advertising politicies GooglAdwords.

Google AdWords: Learning Center:
Basic Definitions

Using Google AdWords for the first time may introduce you to some new terminology. Here are four of the most commonly used AdWords terms (Note: emphasis mine) :

Cost-per-click (CPC): Under its cost-per-click (CPC) pricing model, AdWords will charge your account for each click on your ad(s). You won't incur any costs if your ad is displayed for a search query, but users don't click it.

Advertisers do not have to pay for a displayed ad unless someone clicks on it. Guess what that means for publishers? :

The Google ads you are able to display on your content pages can be either cost-per-click (CPC) or cost-per-1000-impressions (CPM) ads, while AdSense for search results pages show exclusively CPC ads. This means that advertisers pay either when users click on ads, or when the advertiser's ad is shown on your site. You'll receive a portion of the amount paid for either activity on your website. Although we don't disclose the exact revenue share, our goal is to enable publishers to make as much or more than they could with other advertising networks.

(emphasis mine)

The right wing is extremely web saavy. It was 2 years ago that Lorraine noticed how the chritian right was sending ads on all our pages with categories like "reproductive rights", "abortion", and "forced pregnancy".

It's a bold move to advertise in your detractor's site, but that's what makes wingnuts different from liberals : To them, it's do or die.

The propoganda tactics of the right wing are very guerrilla like. They are not shy about forcing their views on others and that's why they raise millions of dollars for propaganda campaigns like the one described in Oh, the irony!.

Do you think the McCain people have done the same or do you think it's just an accident?

Google is not perfect, but guess who reared his ugly head over at my profile page?

Yup, John McCain strikes again.

Honestly, I think he's got a thing for hot negra latinas.

So, what to do? Well, if I filter John McCain out you wouldn't get the pleasure of making his campaign pay for having their ad here in the first place.

Remember what it says at the Google Adwords site? Advertisers pay only if they get clicks. Publishers (allegedly) get paid per 1000 page views but, believe me, when it comes to getting paid what counts are the amounts of clicks my sites generates.

Now, I cannot tell you to click on any ads. That is against Google's terms of use. Yet, I have pointed out what they have on the public domain : Information about how their advertising system works.

You can make your own conclusions.

Still, now that you know, you can turn the republicans and wingnuts guerrilla advertising on any lefty blog of your liking, into your own guerrilla fundraising campaign. Because, remember, the more you click on an ad at your favorite blog, the more the publisher gets paid.

Meaning, this is your chance to play Robin Hood.

Have fun

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