Bing

Bing Ads will automatically clean up legacy Content Network ad groups after Nov. 30

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Back in May, Bing Ads announced that it was closing up its Content Network due to low-quality traffic. On July 31, Bing stopped running Content Network ads and took away the ability to create new content ads. This has, however, left many accounts with legacy “content” ads that were made before July 31. These ads aren’t showing on the Content Network, and Bing Ads will now be cleaning these up on your behalf.

After November 30, Bing Ads will begin to label these ad groups properly. Currently, some ad groups can be labeled as “search and content network” (the former default setting) or “content network,” though they would now be the search network or they wouldn’t be running at all. After November 30, Bing will be proactively cleaning up user accounts by performing the following tasks on all accounts:

  • Turning all ad groups that are currently set to “search and content network” to “search network” only.
  • Deleting any ad group that is exclusively set to “content network.” Note: These ad groups haven’t been serving ads since June 30, and this will not impact your results in comparison to the last two months.
  • Ending users’ ability to create content bids within ad groups.
  • Deleting any keyword with the match type of content.

Advertisers will have the ability to repurpose these ad groups if the ad distribution is changed to “search network” before deletion on November 30.

Most advertisers should welcome this change, as Bing is simply doing some fall cleaning on your behalf.

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Contributing authors are chosen for their expertise and work under the oversight of the editorial staff. Search Engine Land is owned by Semrush. The contributor was not asked to mention Semrush; the opinions expressed are their own.

About the author

Greg Finn
Greg Finn is the Director of Marketing for Cypress North, a company that provides digital marketing and web development. He is a co-host of Marketing O'Clock and has been in the digital marketing industry for nearly 20 years. You can also find Greg on Twitter (@gregfinn) or LinkedIn.