The ability to exclude undesirable ad placements for Smart Shopping campaigns has been spotted in the Google Ads interface. Placement exclusions can be applied to the Google Display Network and YouTube, according to the screenshot (below).

We’ve reached out to Google for more details about this feature but have not received a response at the time of publication. Tip of the hat to Davey Stokkers and Fabio Antichi for first spotting this feature, and Gianpaolo Lorusso for bringing it to our attention.

Why we care

More and more consumers are seeking to purchase from brands that align with their ethics and values. Being able to control what your ads appear alongside can help you prevent unwanted brand associations, which can, in turn, affect your conversion rates.

Additionally, Smart Shopping and Local campaigns will be bundled into Performance Max campaigns sometime in 2022. It’s not clear whether placement exclusions will still be available when that occurs. We will update this article with more details when we receive a response from Google.