Did Google Adwords ban Dr. James Carlson for his low-carb promotion?
As more and more people begin turning to the Internet for useful online information about their health, a popular way for bloggers to bring in a little extra money is through affiliate programs. One of the most predominant ones out there has got to be Google AdSense. If you’ve been on just about any web site lately, then no doubt you’ve seen text ads that look like these:
Keywords from the content of the site you are on are matched with AdWords advertisers who pay Google to post their text ad according to suggested keywords in an effort to reach people who would be interested in purchasing their product or service who then in turn pay publishers (blog and web site owners) a small referral fee to them for providing a prospective customer. As you can see from those examples above (pulled from the Google ads on my blog), the advertisers aren’t exactly for the best products in the world related to diet and health. Even still, every little bit helps and most of the low-carb diet and health bloggers I know use Google ads.
One such blogger who I love and respect for what he is doing to spread the healthy low-carb message is Dr. James E. Carlson, author of the fabulous low-carb book Genocide: How Your Doctor’s Dietary Ignorance Will Kill You. I first interviewed him in June 2008 (listen here and here) and then again for “Encore Week” in January 2009. People immediately connected with the no-holds-barred, in-your-face, blunt style of Dr. Carlson because he refuses to sugarcoat the truth (it’s too high-carb anyway!). He joined us on The 2nd Annual Low-Carb Cruise in 2009 and will again be one of the featured guest speakers in our upcoming March 2010 cruise to the Bahamas. The man exudes passion about “low carbs” as he calls it and even launched his own weekly television show recently.
But as with any rising star in an important movement, there are those who look to stand in the way of their progress and surprisingly this time around it’s an unexpected one for Dr. Carlson — Google! That’s right, in case you didn’t know it, the good folks from the world’s largest search engine company apparently feel threatened by the low-carb message he shares to the point that they would take drastic measures to “disable” the AdSense account of an outspoken low-carb blogger like Dr. Carlson. I was shocked when I first read about this and the following response Google sent to him attempting to explain the situation was absolutely breathtaking:
Hello,
While going through our records recently, we found that your AdSense account has posed a significant risk to our AdWords advertisers. Since keeping your account in our publisher network may financially damage our advertisers in the future, we’ve decided to disable your account. Please understand that we consider this a necessary step to protect the interests of both our advertisers and our other AdSense publishers. We realize the inconvenience this may cause you, and we thank you in advance for your understanding and cooperation. If you have any questions about your account or the actions we’ve taken, please do not reply to this email.
Sincerely,
The Google AdSense Team
Un-freakin’-real! Let’s briefly analyze part of this message from Google:
“going through our records”
What kind of “records” are they talking about? Traffic? Clicks? More likely, it’s some kind of content manager with a clipboard looking through their various AdSense publishers to see what they’re actually writing about. They wouldn’t want to be affiliated with any nut cases, ya know. Like those wacky low-carb people!
“Your AdSense account has posed a significant risk”
Not just a light “risk,” Dr. Carlson, but you are a SIGNIFICANT risk. Ooooo! I wonder what the heck you did to raise the ire of Google to such a degree. Red alert, red alert, the bald physician with the glasses is blogging again! HA! What the heck does it mean that your account “has posed a significant risk?” Not explaining what this means is the height of idiocy on their part.
“Keeping your account…may financially damage our advertisers”
Man, Dr. Carlson, Google must REALLY fear what you are doing claiming that you are harming them and their advertisers with the columns you are posting at your blog. I guess sharing with people about how they can lose weight, improve their health, and beat back some of today’s most hideous preventable diseases makes you as threatening as a terrorist apparently. I still don’t get it other than some nimrod at Google is anti-low-carb.
“We’ve decided to disable your account”
Well that’s mighty fine of you, Google. But you just take this dictatorial action without any explanation whatsoever and refuse to engage in a conversation with the person you are perpetrating this one? That’s just bad business and not the way you should be treating one of your publishers. The very least Dr. Carlson is owed is a REAL explanation for why this happened. Do you have the kahunas to tell him or will you cower behind your form response?
The rest of that bogus letter from the “Google AdSense Team” isn’t worth bothering with. What’s done is done and apparently it’s final. And Dr. Carlson himself wasn’t too thrilled with this action that was taken against him.
Gee, thanks Google, especially the part where I cannot even question your decision, even though we all know why I was kicked off. How cool is that, Google hates me now.
We all know why he was kicked off, right? It’s gotta be the content of his message…although many other blogs, including mine, have not been targeted by Google yet. Well, at least not yet anyway. What could have set them off on Dr. Carlson’s blog? Hmmm…
He notes that “my fight (with Google) has only just begun,” so I’m not sure what this doctor/lawyer has in mind yet. There may be a discrimination lawsuit involved in this somehow, so I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. Even Dr. Carlson isn’t crying over this decision, though, since the Google ads that displayed on his blog were not exactly the highest quality in the world.
For anyone who actually clicked on them, they deal mainly with other diets and meds and just other health food products. Funny thing is, most of the advertisements were for diets that just are not right and for products that are a bunch of malarkey.
Amen to that! It’s too bad Google doesn’t allow their publishers to customize the ads that would best fit with their message, but it doesn’t work that way unfortunately. So why even let these Google ads on his site to begin with?
Well, why not? Anyone who clicked on an ad could easily ask me what my thoughts were on a particular product or service and you have. I felt they stimulated useful dialogue. And most of the time, like I already stated, the product or service was either not helpful and just a waste of money or in some cases even harmful.
Interesting take. And I agree that they serve a mutually beneficial purpose inasmuch as readers can click on them with no obligation to purchase anything while the blog owner is given a few pennies for each click. If 1,000 people a day clicked on those Google ads, then that would net several hundred dollars to help defray the costs of running the site. It’s a win-win for both the readers and the blog owners like Dr. Carlson. Or at least it was until he was banned!
Dr. Carlson has his theory about why he was singled out.
So why shut me down now Google? Obviously someone over at Google or maybe it was one of their advertisers who actually read the contents of my web site or blog and since I sit at odds with a lot of these useless or even harmful products or diets, they pulled their ads from my sites. I guess Google feared that it would lose millions (billions?) in advertising funds because of me telling the truth.
He jokingly added, “Am I becoming more popular than I realize?” Apparently you are, Dr. Carlson, apparently you are! Keep fighting the good fight and doing what you do to spread the healthy low-carb message with the world. By the way, you can access his “Nutritional Wellness” television show from Dream Weaver Radio for FREE now. WOO HOO! Just register here to access all of these wonderfully hilarious and educational videos from Dr. James Carlson.
