Changes in Keyword Planner – Bots remain the main target

Google announced recently that it was going to control access to Keyword Planner data and this announcement raised more questions than what it could answer. Will new advertisers be able to get a detailed Keyword Planner data before launching and setting up campaigns? As per the notice of Google, advertisers with lower monthly expenses might view limited data in the Keyword Planner. But what does lower monthly spend mean? Does it mean $100 per month or $1000 per month?

Such changes will make sure that AdWords advertisers are able to receive the data which they need to optimize their accounts and this explanation seemed to belie the action which was taken by punishing some smaller advertisers. This move was aimed at non-advertisers who used the tool for research purposes and the third-parties started querying on a daily basis. As per a Google representative, this change was brought about so that they could always give data to the advertisers which they require for optimizing their accounts. The changes will also prevent bots and other services from manhandling the actual use of Keyword Planner.

The latest explanation puts stress on high frequency abuse and not on the individual researchers which use the Planner. If the main problem is the frequent pings by the bots, is it the actual way to handle them? Why should you cut off access to the non-paying accounts, most of which are held by high-paying agencies? What is the actual reason for the change?

More so, in order to add on to the confusion, the execution of the change came during a time technical errors and a switch to reporting the same volumes for search for close variants. When users check the warnings which prompt them when they need an active account to utilize Keyword Planner, Google certified and ensured that this is not the case. Nevertheless, there have been reports which suggest that most of the advertisers who run paid campaigns won’t be affected for any kind of change. People are still getting access to Keyword Planner accounts which never had active campaigns.

With this recent change, services and bots using API are being seen as primary targets and the main question is how such a change will have an impact on agencies and advertisers who use Planner in no and low-spend accounts. Hence, this change basically has no such consequence on the Keyword Planner users.