First Look: Hotel Price Ads In Google.com Search Results

For more than a year, Google has been testing a program called Hotel Price Ads that shows ads for hotel searches inside of Google Maps. It looks like those ads are headed to Google’s main search results soon. A Search Engine Land reader has tipped us to three new types of hotel price ads, all […]

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For more than a year, Google has been testing a program called Hotel Price Ads that shows ads for hotel searches inside of Google Maps.

It looks like those ads are headed to Google’s main search results soon. A Search Engine Land reader has tipped us to three new types of hotel price ads, all of which are showing up outside of Google Maps on local searches done on Google.com.

Hotel Price Ads: Three New Google.com Formats

Here’s a screenshot showing the hotel price ads on a local 7-pack for the query “hotels orlando”:

hotel-price-ads-1

In this example, five of the seven hotel listings have the hotel price ads attached. Just like the test inside Google Maps, clicking the price shows a dropdown with prices from advertisers that are participating in the program by giving Google their pricing information.

Two other examples in Google.com search results: first, hotel price ads in the Google Places results, and then a screenshot of the ads on a local inbox result for a single hotel.

hotel-price-ads-2

hotel-price-ads-3

Our source, a Google advertiser, tells us that a Google rep says all three of these ad types will be launching simultaneously, but we don’t know how soon. If we get additional information directly from Google, we’ll update this article.

Google has emphasized since day one that the hotel price ads have no bearing on how hotels are ranked in Google Maps. We assume that’ll remain the case when the ads start showing up in Google.com local search results.

Postscript:

A Google spokesperson confirms for us that this is an experiment. “We don’t have any further to add at this time about future plans, but do want to reiterate that these ads for hotel prices do not change the organic ranking of the affiliated properties, be it in Maps or elsewhere.”


Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.


About the author

Matt McGee
Contributor
Matt McGee joined Third Door Media as a writer/reporter/editor in September 2008. He served as Editor-In-Chief from January 2013 until his departure in July 2017. He can be found on Twitter at @MattMcGee.

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