On February 6, 2013 Google announced their plans to unroll Enhanced Campaigns inside of the AdWords platform. This was by no means the first time the search giant has announced major…erm…upgrades to one of their products, but it is – by far – the biggest changes to their paid platform.
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And of course there was a giant uproar.
I admit, I was – and still am – a huge opponent to the changes coming in the next few months.
Will any of this outcry change the course of events, however?
The answer to this question is – of course – no. If the recent past has taught us anything about Google, it is that they are going to make the changes they feel are best for their customers, and no one – not even their customers – are going to make them change their mind.
But this blog isn’t necessarily about Enhanced Campaigns, Panda, Penguin, or any other update the search engines decide to make.
This blog is more about us as marketers, and our reactions to events like these.
What is Impermanence?
In Buddhism impermanence is simply the fact that nothing on Earth belongs to us. If human beings cannot accept this fact, they become attached to things and will undoubtedly suffer.
And suffering sucks.
We are Attached to an Impermanent Thing
It’s funny that one of the things online marketers say they love about the search industry – whether you are talking about paid or organic – is that everything is constantly evolving and changing. Yet, every time there is a major change we throw our hands up and claim foul.
This is because search is no different than life.
We become attached to concepts and ideas just as easily as we become attached to material things. Just as in life, we need to loosen our attachments to the way we do things.
We need to learn to flow along with the changes that come like the riverbed changes with the stream.
Just like the river, the change is coming whether we resist it or not.
This is not to say that the change is always good or beneficial – at least for us.
Google (and Bing for that matter) is a business, and as a business they are going to do what is best for their bottom line. They will surely mask their intentions as customer-focused, even when the changes are obviously for no other purpose than their bottom line.
What we can do is learn the systems, find the loopholes (going with the flow DOES include learning how to make things easier, right?), and wait patiently for the next “upgrade”.
Because it’s coming.
And we can either keep stressing ourselves out every time it happens, or we can take a deep breath, relax, dive into the rapids and enjoy the ride.