Two months ago Google began testing the color of its ‘Ad’ tag in Google AdWords ads — changing it from yellow to green. What was spoken of as being just a test at the time appears to have been a success, as Google is rolling out the green ‘ad’ tag label to all countries on all devices.
It’s interesting to note that during the time Google was testing the green ad tag color it was also testing the color of its organic links. For a period of time in May, users reported seeing black links in their Google search results instead of blue.
By the company’s own admission it is always testing the look and feel of it’s search results pages and we have seen several examples of that this year. Another test that is currently ongoing is a new minimalist look for search results that users have reported seeing from time to time.
Why The Change?
After following some of the chatter about this news, I couldn’t help but stop to think about this question raised by Brad Longman:
Green Ads rolling out, Better for the user or just an attempt to make Ad's look like organic listings? #adwords #seo pic.twitter.com/FGCCZaxaVz
— Brad Longman (@BradDLongman) June 16, 2016
According to Google, the change was made because of positive feedback from users and advertisers.
Could it be that ads that look less like ads are getting clicked on more? That’s one theory as to why advertisers are liking it more. As to why users like it more, well it could be that a matching green color is more aesthetically pleasing than the contrasting yellow ad tag.
If you’re not seeing the green ad tags yet, you soon will as they’re said to be rolling out to everyone.
