If you’ve spent any time in Google Ads, you know how hard Google works to come across as your “advisor.” Recommendations fill the interface. Specialists working on Google’s behalf call and email to schedule meetings about improving your account. Now there’s a chat assistant built into the platform, giving advice on your account too.
It’s the used car salesman’s arm around your shoulder, the friendly voice assuring you he’s only here to help.
Now I’m not saying all the advice is bad. Far from it! But every piece of it serves Google first, and it only serves you when your interests happen to line up with theirs.
There’s nothing scandalous about that. It’s what lawyers call an arm’s length transaction: you’re doing business together because there’s mutual benefit, and at the same time each side has its own interest in who gets more of the value.
But I don’t think of Google as my advisor. I think of Google as the counterparty. With that in mind, here are three things that caught my attention this month.
#01. Anything you type into Google Ads’ AI chat is now Google’s to use
via Luis Rijo
The gist: On July 1, Google’s updated Ads terms took effect, and anything typed into the AI chat tools inside Google Ads became usable “across various Google Ads features to improve campaign performance.”
The change applied to every account automatically, with no acceptance click. The terms cover the AI tools inside the ads interface, not consumer Gemini.
Why You Should Care: The advisor built into Google Ads answers with Google’s interests baked in. I treat its advice the same way I would treat advice from a used car salesman.
As for what you type into it, Google went out of its way to write into its own terms that your words are theirs to use, and what happens after that is a black box.
I avoid it for serious strategic discussions, and I feel the same way about Google’s ad specialists, the people who email me offering to improve my accounts.
#02. If the switch that lets Google write your ads is on, you’re liable for it as if you wrote it yourself
via Anu Adegbola
The gist: The same July terms authorize Google to “format, select, or generate targets, ads, or destinations” on your behalf, while you stay responsible for reviewing and approving everything the machine produces. The headlines and descriptions its AI writes count as your approved content unless you remove them.
The machine writes from your website and your ad account, and it does not know the rules you practice under or what you deliberately do not offer.
Why You Should Care: Google pushes pretty hard to get you to turn this on, and in certain campaign types it comes turned on by default.
So let’s say the AI writes something for your firm that doesn’t comply with the bar rules. If that happens, the terms make clear it’s strictly on you, and Google will not own it.
I think everyone understands by now that you shouldn’t copy and paste what an AI chatbot writes without having a human put eyes on it first. But that’s exactly what happens with this setting turned on. So I always turn it off, and if it is on, someone needs to be regularly reviewing what the machine creates.
Most firm owners have no idea whether this is running on their account. It’s worth asking whoever runs your ads whether it’s on, and if it is, whether they’re reviewing everything it writes.
#03. When someone needs a lawyer, Google is still the first place they look
via iLawyerMarketing
The gist: iLawyerMarketing surveyed 1,110 Americans this year on which online sources they would use to research attorneys for an important legal issue.
Google led everything at 72%, with ChatGPT second at 42% and no other source above 20%. Google’s share is down from 87% a year ago while ChatGPT climbs fast, but the gap is still wide.
Why You Should Care: ChatGPT is now second only to Google, at 42%. Google isn’t shrinking, though. Its search volume keeps setting records, so the pie got bigger rather than moving somewhere else.
Google Ads still puts your firm in front of someone at the moment they want to call you, which in marketing is called bottom-of-the-funnel or commercial search. The game is always changing, and it pays to stay on top of it.
Speaking of that change, it’s a good reason not to lean on any single channel. At Baltzer Marketing, we help law firms show up in all the places people look online, including Google Ads and AI tools like ChatGPT. Want to know where your firm stands, plus a few personalized tips for quick wins? Book a marketing review with me.
Takeaways
Takeaway #1: Don’t let Google write your ads unless somebody is reviewing what it writes. Otherwise you’re taking the risk that Google publishes something in your name, without your approval, without you ever knowing.
Takeaway #2: Don’t take your strategy from Google, whether it comes from the advisor inside Google Ads or from the specialist who calls and emails you about your account. They work on Google’s behalf, so I take their recommendations with a grain of salt. When I want to talk through an account with AI, I use a chatbot outside the platform, like ChatGPT or Claude, and I make sure my conversations aren’t being used to train the model.
Takeaway #3: Cover your bases. Show up in Google Ads, on your Google Business Profile, in the regular search results, and in the AI tools. Don’t rely on one source; diversify your marketing, and make sure you show up everywhere people are searching.
Want help with any of that? Book a free marketing review and I’ll show you where your firm is showing up, where it isn’t, and what I’d fix first.