Advertiser Lost Thousands Of Dollars Lost During Google Ads Experimental Test

A respected advertiser in the PPC community said that a Google Ads experiment that the customer did not opt in to or have the option to opt out of cost the company thousands of dollars in lost ad spend.

Melissa Mackey posted the details on X saying that she “kept quiet about this Google Ads issue I’ve been having, but the latest reply from support has me seething.” She said that a client of hers started showing in “expanded targeting” despite being opted out of that setting. Melissa then paused the Google campaigns and contacted support. Google Ads support told her that it was a “bug,” and was then given a refund.

So then Melissa resumed the Google Ads campaigns. She then noticed that the same issue happened again. So this time she contacted support once again and got a response that she was not expecting.

She said she was told “From time to time the Google Ads team runs incremental experiments on campaigns to test the impact of a proposed change… Team confirmed that for this issue we might not provide any credit or refund.”

Melissa added that these “tests” cost her client “literally thousands of dollars.” “And we’re just supposed to absorb that so Google can experiment,” she added.

Google’s Ad Lisiaon, Ginny Marvin, replied on X saying “I’ll follow up on it.”

Here are those posts:

Client’s ads started showing in “expanded targeting” despite being opted out of that setting. 2/8

— Melissa L Mackey (@beyondthepaid) September 11, 2023

Resumed campaigns. Issue happened again. Contacted support. 4/8

— Melissa L Mackey (@beyondthepaid) September 11, 2023

WHAT??!!?? 6/8

— Melissa L Mackey (@beyondthepaid) September 11, 2023

.@adsliaison what gives on this? It’s crazy to me. 8/8

— Melissa L Mackey (@beyondthepaid) September 11, 2023

Thank you Ginny. Appreciate it.

— Melissa L Mackey (@beyondthepaid) September 11, 2023

So curious how this ends up… So far, nothing has happened:

No resolution yet, I haven’t heard back from anyone at Google

— Melissa L Mackey (@beyondthepaid) September 12, 2023

Only that they’re “looking into it.” Both Ginny and our rep did finally reply to me, but with no additional insight or resolution.

— Melissa L Mackey (@beyondthepaid) September 13, 2023

Forum discussion at X.