How to Set AdWords to Exclude Parked Domains
Parked domains could be delivering low quality traffic to your AdWords campaigns while costing considerable sums of money. This post explains how to turn off traffic from parked domains.
What are Parked Domains?
Parked domains are typically domains that have expired I.e. the domain owner does not renew the domain fee and therefore the domain lapses and becomes available for others to buy. Often, SEO companies buy these domains because aged domains can be valuable, especially if they have good levels of inbound links. Domains may be bought in order to monetise traffic through AdSense or similar programmes.
At Search Laboratory we have noticed that search campaigns are gaining more and more traffic from parked domains, especially in competitive markets with high click prices. We would argue that parked domains are not necessarily delivering search traffic, and we know that turning this feature off can greatly improve overall campaign performance.
The Setting
In AdWords, navigate to the campaign for which you would like to turn this setting off. Do not select all online campaigns or the setting will not show – you need to do this for every campaign!
Select the ‘Networks’ tab as highlighted in yellow below:
At the bottom of the page, expand the selection ‘Exclusions’. See yellow below:
Under Campaign level click ‘Add exclusions’ then ‘Exclude Category’:
In the list that appears, tick to exclude ‘Parked domains’ as below:
Save, and you will no longer have your ads served on parked domains.
Insights
