Interesting new blog post from today

@CindyLouWho_2 - I just binge-read your blog. Thank you for tracking so many issues, and for so thoroughly documenting the data you’ve gathered (and others have sent you) and sharing it with us all.

It’s unfortunate that there are so many big questions right now. Between the changes they did in ranking for the free shipping guarantee/changing how Ads work/ system issues where listings are being suppressed, it is really difficult to pinpoint (or fix) the issues that are causing decreased traffic/sales for many.

I find it interesting that it seems like Ads seem to bypass some of the issues. For example, sellers who did not succumb to the free shipping BS still had their Ads at the top of results. And sellers with missing items in organic search can still see their items in Ads.

However, many people, such as myself, have no interest in their combined Ad system, and are just plain boycotting it, due to not wanting to waste money on Google.

I have heard rumors that there is a threshold of some sort, and if your Ad budget is below that, you won’t be shown on Google. I’ve been tinkering with it. At $3 max spend, I was getting hits from the Google Ads they place. But they were not placing any with my budget. I monitored that for a couple weeks. I just moved up to $10, and got 7 clicks from Google Ads they placed with my budget. Have you heard anything about this alleged threshold? It would be nice to have some sort of way to game the system and at least have some PL-only type of visibility if your listings are gone from organic or if they start messing with placement for free shipping guarantee again.

/r/Etsy Thread Parent