AdWords Stops Showing Ads in Right Column

Surprise!

Google, with almost no fanfare, decided to stop showing any AdWords ads on the right side of the search engine results page. Now ads are only on the top left (up to 4) and bottom left of the page. This means there are fewer ads on the page, so if your ad used to show in the 4th or 5th position on the right side of the page, it may no longer be displayed on the first page at all. It may be pushed to the second page… and very few searchers bother looking at the second page!

Given that ads have always been on the right side of the page, this comes as a shock to many. But the real question is “What does this mean to advertisers?”

It’s too early to tell for sure what it will mean, but the pundants are already guessing it means small advertisers will suffer because large companies will begin bidding more to make sure their ads are shown on the first page.

Stay tuned…