--- title: "Search Antitrust Rulings: Ad Account Checks as Rules Shift" description: "Search antitrust rulings won't change your Google Ads account overnight. Run these checks now: conversion tracking, network settings and search terms." canonical: "https://socialinfluencebuilder.com/blog/google-antitrust-ruling-ad-account-checks/" lastmod: "2026-10-12T20:31:34+00:00" lang: "en-CA" format: "markdown" --- [Web version of this page](https://socialinfluencebuilder.com/blog/google-antitrust-ruling-ad-account-checks/) HTML version: [French Markdown version](https://socialinfluencebuilder.com/fr/blogue/decisions-antitrust-verification-compte-google-ads.md) [English Markdown version](https://socialinfluencebuilder.com/blog/google-antitrust-ruling-ad-account-checks.md) # Search Antitrust Rulings: Ad Account Checks as Rules Shift Search antitrust rulings keep showing up in the news, and business owners in Mascouche and across Greater Montréal ask me whether they should worry about their Google Ads accounts. My answer is not yet, and maybe not at all. Courts move slowly, and your campaigns run today the same way they ran last month. I'm Marven Salgado, founder of Social Influence, and I still tell owners to run a short list of checks now, starting with the one I see missed most often. ## Search antitrust rulings: what they change for a small Google Ads account and what they do not Search antitrust rulings don't change your Google Ads account overnight: your keywords, bids, ads and settings look the same the morning after a decision as they did the night before. These cases deal with how Google runs its search and advertising business as a whole. What could change over time is how Google structures its auctions, what data it discloses, and how much room competitors get in the market. One example is which search engine comes preset on phones and browsers, since that affects how many searches your ads can appear on. Any of those could shift where ads show and what clicks cost. That work goes through courts and regulators, and it's slow. So don't pause your campaigns while you wait for the next decision. Pausing costs you visibility and the conversion data your bidding learns from, and no court headline lowers your costs right away. Google announces some changes by email and on its advertising policy pages, but not every change reaches you that way. The more you depend on search ads for new customers, the more often you should open the account yourself. Run a Google Ads account audit now, whatever the news says. The problems that cost a small business money today are usually wasted spend, poor targeting and conversion tracking that's out of date. If your ads spend every month and the phone stays quiet, you're dealing with [ads without results](/your-situation/ads-without-results/), and the causes are usually sitting inside the account. ## Conversion tracking in Google Ads: the first account check Conversion tracking comes first because it decides what your bid strategy optimizes for, and thin or broken signals hurt results whatever happens in court. I start on the conversions summary under Goals to see what Smart Bidding is learning from. If those signals are missing or broken, no ruling or algorithm update will fix your results, so it's the first thing I fix in any account I take on in the Montréal area. ### Calls, forms and GA4 imports that bid strategies learn from A bid strategy only knows what counts as a win from the conversion actions you give it. If your tracking counts form fills and nothing else, Google has no idea that phone calls matter to your business. I check three sources in every account: | Signal | What it tells Smart Bidding | | --- | --- | | Form submissions | A lead came in through your website | | Phone calls | Someone was ready to talk | | GA4 imports | Key events such as bookings, purchases or sign-ups | Then I look at which of those actions are set as primary. Google Ads bids toward primary conversion actions and only reports on secondary ones, so a call action left as secondary does nothing for the bidding. I also look for the same form counted twice, once by the Google Ads tag and once through a GA4 import. If both are primary, every lead counts double and the bid strategy learns from inflated numbers. Calls usually need the most work, because a call from an ad and a call from someone who found your number on your website are tracked in different ways. Getting each kind of call into the account so the bidding counts it is what [call conversion tracking](/services/call-conversion-tracking/) is for. Without all three sources connected, your bid strategy is guessing with half the picture. Once they're in place, you have a [Google Ads account where every call is traced](/systems/google-ads-every-call-traced/) back to the campaign that produced it. Loi 25 applies to this tracking as well, so set it up with proper consent and a privacy notice that explains it. ## Search network settings and automatic recommendations Search network settings decide where your ads can appear beyond Google's own results, and automatic recommendations can change a campaign without you clicking anything, so I check both in every campaign. I used to click past these settings without much thought. When you create a Search campaign, the Google search partners option is usually switched on, which lets your ads show on sites outside Google's results page, and the Display Network option is often on too. Now I open the network settings in each campaign and decide on each option myself, based on whether those placements bring in calls and forms. Automatically applied recommendations get the same treatment. If auto-apply is turned on, Google can apply some recommendations by itself, such as broadening keywords or opting a campaign into new features. One at a time they look harmless. I review each one before accepting it, and I keep auto-apply off for anything that touches keywords, bids or budgets. It takes a few minutes and keeps the budget going where I want it. While you're in the campaign settings, check location and language. For a Québec business I usually set the location option to people in, or regularly in, the area you target. The default, "Presence or interest", also reaches people who have only shown interest in that area, and they may live nowhere near your shop. Language targeting should include French and English if you serve customers in both, and with Loi 96 in force you'll want your French ads ready anyway. ## Keywords, match types and search terms reports Keywords and match types decide which searches can trigger your ads, and the search terms report shows the searches that actually did, so read that report before you change a match type. Broad match casts the widest net, while phrase and exact match narrow it. When a term has nothing to do with your business, add it as a negative keyword. When a term spends without bringing calls or forms, lower the bid or pause the keyword behind it. Before you touch any budget, sort the report into brand and non-brand terms. ### Brand versus non-brand budget splits Brand and non-brand searches belong in separate campaigns with separate budgets, because when they share one, cheap brand clicks can hide a non-brand campaign that's losing money. Brand clicks usually cost less and convert faster, since the person searching already knows your business name. Mixed in with everything else, they make the whole campaign look healthier than it is. Sorting the search terms into the two groups shows whether cheap brand clicks have been covering for a weak non-brand strategy and where wasted spend has been draining the budget for months. It also tells you which keywords deserve more money and which ones don't. From then on, review each campaign's results separately every month. ## Google Business Profile and local ads alongside search campaigns Google Business Profile belongs in the same review as your Search campaigns, because a local ad that leads people to an outdated profile breaks the promise the ad made. Old hours, a wrong phone number or weak photos hurt conversions and waste budget, since the person who clicked finds something that doesn't match the ad. I make sure the profile's categories and services describe the same work the campaigns advertise, so the ad and the profile tell the same story. I review profiles more often than I used to. I keep posts current, respond to reviews, and check that the location assets in the ad account pull the correct address from the linked profile before any budget gets spent. ## A monthly account review rhythm for a Québec small business A monthly account review rhythm is one session a month where you go through the same checks in the same order, so a change in cost or results doesn't turn into a scramble. Running Google Ads for a small business in Québec means staying alert, since court rulings and policy changes can affect how ads get shown and how data gets used. Each month I go through the account in this order: 1. Read the change history. Google Ads records each edit and who made it, including auto-applied recommendations, so when costs move you can tell whether something inside the account caused it. 2. Check the search terms and cut anything wasting budget, so the money goes to people who want what you sell. 3. Confirm that conversion tracking still works for calls, forms and GA4 imports, and that the right actions are primary. 4. Review ad copy, in French and in English, against current policies, so you don't wake up to a disapproved ad. 5. Compare costs with last month, so surprises don't drain your cash flow. If an agency runs your account, ask them to walk you through the same list every month: what changed and who changed it, which conversion actions the bidding uses, which search terms were cut, and how costs compare with last month. All of those answers are in the account, so you can ask to see them on screen. ## Go further - **Service:** [Call and Conversion Tracking for Grand Montreal SMBs](https://socialinfluencebuilder.com/services/call-conversion-tracking/)