Google has just announced a fairly significant change to their SERPs. It isn’t regarding the actual search results, but in the ads that are displayed. Up to this point, Google has displayed advertisements at the top of the page as well as off to the right. Going forward, however, the ads on the right will no longer be present. This change will impact all the language sites.
The one exception to this change is when product listings are searched for. When this happens Google may show product listing ads off to the right. These ads typically have more detailed information where the extra space can make the ad more attractive.
Another change that they are implementing is that the ads on the top of the page will have four slots rather than three for certain searches. Most of the results will still just have the three listings, but for ‘highly commercial’ searches a fourth may appear.
In the official statement Google said, “We’ve been testing this layout for a long time, so some people may see it on a very small number of commercial queries. We’ll continue to make tweaks, but this is designed for highly commercial queries where the layout is able to provide more relevant results for people searching for better performance for advertisers.”
