If I bid on my brand name, will it make the keyword more expensive for my competitors

[Catherine_Selectaglaze]

Our brand name is being bid on by out competitors.  If we bid on our own brand name, for which we rank #1 for all our profiles and website, will we make our competitors cost per click higher?

[Martijn_Scheijbeler]

Hi Catherine,

Depends on what position you'll end up. Which likely will be position nr1 as the quality score for your own brand name will likely be very high. Then you would drive up the CPC probably, but I must say that brand bids are usually very low. So only if you have thousands of clicks on them every month it probably won't affect your competitors spend that much ;-).

[Happy-SEO]

Hi Catherine,

Yes, it will make your competitors cost per click higher. Mainly because in this case you will get the highest quality score. Bidding on your own brandname gives (most of the time) a 10 out of 10. Competitors will get a very low Quality score (not relevant) and have to bid more to rank higher.

[Highland]

Is your brand name trademarked? If so, you can use that trademark to remove ads that contain your trademark in their ad copy (here's the Google form for Trademark complaints in ads).

Generally speaking, it's a good idea to bid on your own name. Case in point: we started TV ads this year and while we rank #1 for our brand, when the TV spots started we saw an enormous surge in people searching our brand name. Also, remember that some searches (especially on mobile) do not show any organic results above the fold. Bidding on your own brand name should be an integral part of your marketing strategy. Don't worry about making it more expensive for your competitors.

[Catherine_Selectaglaze]

Thank you Martijn

That's really helpful!

[Catherine_Selectaglaze]

Thank you Highland

That was very helpful!