Google has updated their “Display URL” policy in Google AdWords, meaning advertisers will now have to display matching destination and display URLs. Google’s policy of matching your display and destination URLs has been around for a while, but will be strictly enforced starting April 1st 2008.

As per the existing policy, Google will require both URLs to match, eg:

If you destination is www.google.com, you can not show

• www.google.co.uk (different site)
• www.gogle.com (has a redirect to google.com)
• www.gooogle.com (has content identical to google.com)

However. the program will still allow advertisers to use tracking URLs as long as the landing page URL matches the domain of the display URL. For example the following would be accepted:

Display URL: www.google.com/adwords
Destination URL: www.trackingurl.com/google123
–> Landing page URL: www.google.com would be acceptable

Advertisers will also still be able to use sub domains as long as the top level domains of both the display and destination URLs match. Advertisers who need to make changes should do so as soon as possible to avoid being penalized after the 1st of April. All advertisers will also receive a reminder in their AdWords accounts before the deadline.

For more info on Google’s policy update, visit the AdWords Help Center, or Inside Adwords blog.