Promoting Honorees Without Unwanted Placements: Using Google Ads Account-Level Exclusions

Stop Honoree Promos Showing in the Wrong Places: A Google Ads Account-Level Exclusions Playbook

Hook: You invest time and reputation creating awards and honoree campaigns — the last thing you need is a high-profile honoree ad running next to extremist, adult, or clickbait inventory. In 2026, with Google Ads automation like Performance Max and Demand Gen dominating spend, one misplaced placement can damage trust, anger stakeholders, and undo PR wins. This playbook shows you exactly how to use Google Ads' account-level placement exclusions to keep honoree promos on brand-safe inventory, at scale.

Why this matters now (2026 context)

Late 2025 and early 2026 accelerated two trends that matter to award programs and honors marketing teams:

• Google Ads introduced account-level placement exclusions (Jan 15, 2026), letting advertisers block domains, apps, and YouTube channels across all eligible campaigns instead of setting exclusions per campaign.
• Automated campaign formats (Performance Max, Demand Gen) expanded, giving machines more control over placement decisions — which increases efficiency but reduces manual placement control.

Together, these trends make centralized guardrails essential. For award programs, that means protecting honorees' reputations while preserving the reach and automation benefits of Google’s ad formats.

What this playbook delivers

This is a step-by-step, operational playbook for marketing teams and small business owners running award or honoree promotions. You will get:

• A prioritized, repeatable checklist to implement account-level placement exclusions
• Concrete exclusion lists and category templates tailored for honoree promos
• Testing, monitoring and rollback procedures
• Measurement KPIs and dashboards to prove safety without losing performance

Quick overview: How account-level placement exclusions change the game

Before Jan 2026, exclusions were scattered: campaign or ad-group level controls that were time-consuming to maintain. The new account-level option means you create a single exclusion list and it automatically blocks inventory across eligible formats — including Performance Max, Demand Gen, YouTube, and Display. That centralized approach:

• Reduces human error from manual, campaign-by-campaign blocking
• Makes brand safety scalable for multi-campaign award programs
• Is essential when relying on automation to optimize reach and conversions

Step-by-step playbook: Implementing account-level placement exclusions

Step 1 — Governance and scope: align stakeholders

Before you touch Google Ads, get quick alignment:

• Who approves the master exclusion list? (PR lead, legal, program director)
• Which campaigns or properties are in scope? (All honoree campaigns, legacy remarketing only, cross-account?)
• Define unacceptable content categories for honoree promotions (adult, gambling, extremist, piracy, fake news, illegal activities, explicit language, etc.).

Step 2 — Audit current placements and inventory risk

Run a placement and performance audit across the last 90 days:

1. Export placement reports for Display, Video, and Performance Max insights (where available).
2. Identify high-risk placements where impressions or clicks already occurred.
3. Flag any placements that caused stakeholder concern (escalate to PR/legal).

Actionable tip: Sort by spend and by impression share to prioritize exclusions that protect the most impressions first.

Step 3 — Build the account-level exclusion list

From the Google Ads UI (Tools & settings → Shared library → Account-level placement exclusions), create a master exclusion list called something like Honoree_Program_Exclusions_2026. Populate it using these layered approaches:

Layer A — High-risk domain seeds (must-block examples)

• Adult and explicit content domains
• Sites known for illegal activity, piracy, or file-sharing
• Top clickbait/misinformation properties previously flagged by your audit

Layer B — Category and topic blocks

Use Google’s content exclusions where available (sensitive topics, e.g., illicit behavior, explicit sexual content). Account-level exclusions complement these — they block specific placements while category settings block classes of content.

Layer C — YouTube channel and app exclusions

Add channels and apps by ID or URL. Note: YouTube is included in account-level exclusions per Google’s Jan 2026 update, so prioritize high-risk channels discovered in your audit.

Step 4 — Apply and test incrementally

Do not flip the master list on account-wide with no testing. Use a staged approach:

1. Create a new test campaign using the same assets and targeting as your honoree promo.
2. Apply the account-level exclusion list to that test campaign only (if the UI allows scoped application) or implement account-wide but start with a low budget for live campaigns.
3. Run for 48–72 hours, then review placement reports and performance metrics.

Key test metrics: impressions on blocked inventory (should be zero), CPM, CTR, conversion rate, and brand lift metrics if you measure awareness.

Step 5 — Monitor and iterate

Once validated, apply the exclusion list across the honoree campaign portfolio. Then:

• Schedule automated weekly placement reports (Looker Studio/Google Sheets)
• Set alerts for any impressions on new, unreviewed domains
• Re-run a content audit monthly — new publisher domains appear all the time

Step 6 — Maintain a change log and rollback plan

Every time someone adds or removes a domain from the master list, log the change with reason and approver. Keep a rollback plan to re-enable placements if performance collapses after blocking, but only after PR/legal approves the trade-off.

Practical exclusion list templates for honoree promos

Below are high-level templates — customize them for your industry and program risk tolerance.

Core

Related Reading

• A/B Test Ideas: Measuring Promo Offers with Google’s Total Campaign Budgets
• Streaming Shake-Up: How Global Media Consolidation Could Change What You Watch in the Emirates
• Promoting Dry January All Year: Alcohol-Free Pairings for Noodle Menus
• Best Budget Light Therapy Lamps for Collagen and Tone (Under $150)
• Post-Patch Build Guide: How to Re-Spec Your Executor, Guardian, Revenant and Raider