Let me ask you a simple question; When was the last time you saw a YouTube ad for a product you were actuall interested in? Now if Google can't show you a relevant ad, how do you expect them to show your ads to relevant people?
Google is supposed to know everything about you; Your habits, what you like, who you hang out with, and what you buy. So how come it is impossible for them to serve you ads you're actually interested in?
My YouTube ads
5 years ago Google would serve me ads I was actually interested in, for products I could imagine myself needing. That was 5 years ago. Today, YouTube exclusively shows me ads that have zero relevance to me.
About 50% of my ads are Greek ads. Sure, I live in Cyprus, but I don't speak Greek, and neither does 25% of the population on the island. This implies that Google is basically stealing advertising money from Cypriot companies, to force feed to users with zero capability of actually understanding the ad. I have no idea what this ad says, but I've been getting lots of them lately.
The rest of my ads are basically either deep fake crypto scam, depicting Elon Musk, trying to convince me to send my money to some shady Russian crypto exchange registered in the Cayman Island - Or some Russian mobster trying to have me install his malware into my trading account, at which point it'll steal all my crypto and send to Vladimir Putin or something. If I tried to pull what Google is doing, I'd probably be extradited to the US and face 25 years in prison ...
Before you ask, I have never owned a trading account!
The last 6 months I've seen two relevant ads, which I somewhat could possibly have an interest in; One ad for Monday.com and another ad for ClickUp - Besides from that, 99% of every single ad YouTube is serving me is basically garbage, that I have absolutely no interest in what so ever, and which if I was given the choice, I'd rather chose Chlamydia before I'd actually purchase products from - Or ads in Greek, that I've got no understanding of what so ever.
While we're at it, WTF is Skroutz ...?
Google stole 15,000 EUROs from me
In 2023 and early 2024, Google basically stole 15,000 EUROs from me. Every where I turned, I would be told that I needed to buy Google Ads to sell our products. I believed in their rubbish so I spent about 15,000 EUROs on Google Ads, and I got 3 clients from it. In comparison, I spent $300 on LinkedIn ads last week, and I got 3 clients from these.
This implies that my ROAS for LinkedIn ads is 50 times higher!
I always thought it was something wrong with me, that I had misunderstood how Google Ads worked, so I would watch hundreds of hours of YouTube videos, trying to become "an Expert Google Ad campaign manager". I even installed ClickCease and turned off "display network", and I tried half a dozen different types of campaigns, and did my keyword research and optimised my campaigns so much, I'd some weeks spend 10 to 15 hours optimising our Google Ad campaigns.
Still, nothing worked!
Google Ads is a SCAM!
Then I realised that if Google can't serve me a single relevant ad on YouTube, how can I expect that they can serve my ads to relevant people?
I wish there was some sort of joke coming here. A trillion dollar company, the very foundation of the modern world wide web, can't possibly be a scam, can it? Unfortunately there's no joke coming. After months of thinking about this, I've concluded with that Google Ads is basically a scam. Let me repeat that if you didn't get it ...
GOOGLE ADS IS A SCAM!!
They will serve your ads to people having zero interest in seeing your ads. In addition, they will put your ads on display networks, allowing "their partners" to display your ads in return for 70% commission. "Their partners" here being click farms in Bangladesh of course, having hundreds of people who's sole task is to sit for 12 hours, 7 days per week, and simply click your ads - At which point their employer runs away with 70% of your advertisement budget.
For fuck sake Google, if I wanted to send my money to Bangladesh, I'd find a school project or something to send my money to. Not some psychopath CEO thief, hiring 500 teenagers under slave like conditions, working out of a warehouse in the slum of Bangladesh, to work 80 hours per week, clicking other peoples' ads, to steal money from other companies in Europe and the US ...
Of course, if I did, Google wouldn't get their 30% commission from my advertisement budget ...
Google is supposed to know everything about me. They've got arguably the smartest business plan invented the last 50 years, which is that people search for stuff, and they're supposed to show only relevant ads according to whatever search query people provide them with.
Still they're somehow magically capable of providing me with an ROAS (Return On Advertisement Spending) that's 2% of what LinkedIn is able to give me. Google's business model is supposed to be 50 times better than LinkedIn's business model. Still, LinkedIn for all practical concerns, is 50 times better than Google - How is that even possible? Did Sundar Pichai like amputate half his brain or something 5 years ago ...?
Can somebody at Google answer me please? Have you really become that retarded over the last 5 years? Are you really that fucking dumb Google? What went wrong? Did you like fire all your smartest people, and hired only communists and thieves, who's sole purpose in life was to send money to click farms in Bangladesh or something ...?
Do you have an answer Google ...?
The world deserves an answer, because running a company so thoroughly into the garbage can as you've managed to do the last 5 years shouldn't even be possible Sundar Pichai, and we deserve to know the answer of how you managed to do it, such that future generations can avoid repeating your mistakes ...
Top comments (1)
Yes, people often "think" Google would be a good value to advertise with, even defying the evidence of their own eyes and experiences on the receiving end. The model is a scam in a sense it uses information that often has nothing to do with actual interest to determine the "value" it claims to bring you. A click is so often not a signal of genuine interest by a genuine customer.
I am not surprised you would find a higher rate of return on LinkedIn, the advertising is less intrusive, and the audience would be more...mature.