We understand how important it is for users to be able to purchase pharmaceuticals online for themselves or for loved ones, and we've decided to update our Google AdWords online pharmacy policy to ensure that the experience purchasing these products through our ads is a positive one. The change will go into effect towards the end of this month.

There are two main aspects to this change:

Only VIPPS and CIPA certified pharmacies will be allowed to advertise
We've made the decision to further restrict the ads we accept for online pharmacy sites in the U.S. and Canada. Starting at the end of this month, Google AdWords will only accept ads from online pharmacies in the U.S. that are accredited by the National Association Boards of Pharmacy VIPPS program, and from online pharmacies in Canada that are accredited by the Canadian International Pharmacy Association (CIPA.)

Pharmacies can only target ads within their country
These pharmacies may only target ads to users in the country in which they are accredited. This policy change does not affect our online pharmacy policy for countries outside the U.S. and Canada.

Accordingly, we'll no longer be using any 3rd party verifier of online pharmacies other than VIPPS and CIPA. AdWords advertisers who aren't accredited by VIPPS or CIPA will no longer see their online pharmacy ads displayed once this policy change comes into effect

We'll post to this blog again once the changes go into effect towards the end of this month. For more information on our pharmacy policy, please see this link: http://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=7463.

Posted by Dan Friedman, Inside AdWords crew

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 9th, 2010 at 11:18 am and is filed under PPC News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.