Ads in Google News Turn it into a PR Playground

The Google News team blogs that contextual ads are now running alongside of news search results...

"What this means is that when you enter a query like iPhone or Kindle into the Google News search box, you'll see text ads alongside your News search results--similar to what you see on regular Google searches or Google Book Search."

Read between the lines and guess what that really means: Google News is now a PR playground. Given the relative ease of launching a simple Google Adwords campaign we're going to see a lot of companies - some legit, others not - buying up real estate on Google News solely for influence, not clicks. Google may bounce these ads if they don't perform - time will tell.

It's already happening. Here's a case in point. Last week an eagle-eyed reader alerted SEO blogger Barry Schwartz that one advertiser tried to use Google News sponsored links as a way spread fake news - in this case a false rumor that President Obama was killed. The ad, Schwartz notes, was pulled down. But you can bet there will be more. And clearly some people saw it.

On the whole, I am bullish about ads in Google News. The PR industry largely missed the first search engine marketing wave and I believe that, at least when it comes to smaller campaigns, we still have time to catch up. Richard Edelman, our CEO, is also thinking the same way (see point #3). For more, see this post from my colleague, Marhsall Manson, on how good SEO is an outcome of good PR. Ads on Google News will serve as just another log on the fire that will encourage PR pros to boost their search knowledge. 
However, the ethics issues around contextual news ads and search overall are huge, particularly on sites like Google News. It will fascinating to see what Google deems as kosher/not - and to what degree people in PR and outside may try to push the boundaries.