Is Your Vendor Sharing Your Data With You?

May 18, 2009

“But our paid search vendor won’t give me access to our keywords and ads,” complained an attendee at our GA training in DC.  (I promised her that I wouldn’t use her name.)

“Hmm,” said I, “That seems a little awful.  You would think they would keep you locked up as a customer based on how wonderful they are, not based on your inability to get at your own data.”  In fact, I mused out loud to her, I wonder if that is a violation of the paid search terms and conditions….

…. so I did a search for Google AdWords Terms of Service, and I found this:

6     Agency. Customer represents and warrants that (a) it is authorized to act on behalf of and has bound to this Agreement any third party for which Customer advertises (a “Principal“), (b) as between Principal and Customer, the Principal owns any rights to Program information in connection with those ads, and (c) Customer shall not disclose Principal’s Program information to any other party without Principal’s consent.

So, I’m not a lawyer, but it seems to me that if the customer is an agency and advertises on behalf of a Principal (a real company), then the Principal owns the data. I don’t see that it says, the Principal must have access to the data, but hey, if you own it, you should be able to look at it, no?

And before I close — if you are in the NY Metro area and are interested in learning some actionable insights for your Google Analytics (techie or marketing), come to our GA Training Day, June 2 in Manhattan ($285 per person.) Learn more here.

Robbin