Two rule families, and the one that covers card offers
"Are credit cards allowed?" is the wrong first question. The retrieved Google publisher policy extract lists prohibited content such as pornography, explosives, firearms, tobacco, recreational drugs, alcohol misuse, online gambling, and prescription drugs; credit cards are absent. Credit-related products appear instead in privacy and personalized-advertising rules, with examples including cards, loans, bank accounts, and debt management products. For a plain card page, the usual risk is a promise, not the topic. A US/Canada restriction also limits targeting for credit-related products by gender, age, parental status, marital status, or postal code; the excerpt is fragmented.
| Policy family | What the retrieved text restricts | Where a card page meets it |
|---|
| Prohibited content | Pornography, explosives, firearms, tobacco, recreational drugs, alcohol misuse, online gambling, prescription drugs; credit cards not named | Rarely direct; only if other restricted material appears |
| Privacy and personalized ads | Negative financial status, low credit rating or high debt; US/Canada limits on credit-related targeting by gender, age, parental status, marital status, postal code | Audience lists, remarketing, and copy implying knowledge of credit situation |
| Misrepresentation | Concrete impossible promises are egregious (1 strike); unclear promises are normal (5 = 1 strike); examples: free or cash offers, promising loans, no-credit-check promise | Approval guarantees, "no credit check," free-money framing, uncontrolled outcomes |
This separates topic, targeting, and promise risks. The categories overlap in practice but trigger different checks.
The claim patterns that get flagged
"Guaranteed approval," "instant approval," "no credit check," and "get approved regardless of credit" promise outcomes the publisher cannot control. The retrieved penalty documentation calls concrete, explicitly stated promises that cannot be fulfilled egregious. Examples include "Free or cash offers," "Promising loans," and an account opening with no credit check. One egregious violation equals one strike; five normal violations equal one strike. Triage accordingly: unclear promises may be cleanup; impossible promises are stop-and-fix.
Related misrepresentation guidance also prohibits false, untrue, or deceptive promotion of products or services. Rewrite by subtraction, not a disclaimer paragraph. Delete the guarantee and describe what the page provides: "Compare card offer details and issuer terms," not "Get approved today." Add a condition only when true and verifiable. Do not soften "no credit check" into wording that still implies the same result; let the issuer's linked terms carry the application process. Free or cash framing needs the same test: if the page does not clearly deliver that value, the promise is exposed.
Your promise must match your page
Sentence edits are not enough. Traffic-source rules require the source to describe accurately what the user will see. They forbid promising products, services, or promotions absent or hard to find on the landing page, and forbid misleading statements about them. The page must look substantially the same as it does to organic visitors; paid and organic traffic cannot get different versions.
Test backward. Read the ad or link, then open the page as a visitor would. Is the named offer present and findable without hunting through ad units? If the referring copy says "best card offer" but the page is a general comparison, narrow the copy or add a substantiated offer. A separate paid-traffic page is not a workaround.
What you cannot assume about the reader
Personalized ads may not be selected or targeted using negative financial-status information or other detailed personal-finance data. The retrieved text names information indicating a low credit rating or high debt burden. This is an audience-setup issue as much as a copy issue. A page implying "we know your credit is bad" is not made safer by a disclaimer. Review audience lists and remarketing settings.
The US/Canada restriction also bars personalized ad targeting for credit-related products by gender, age, parental status, marital status, or postal code. The text is jurisdiction-specific and partially excerpted. Where personalized advertising is used with Google products, advertisers must disclose interest-based advertising and follow frameworks such as the Digital Advertising Alliance principles or the IAB Europe OBA Framework.
Page composition and ad-unit placement
A card comparison page can fail at layout level. Google ads may not be shown on screens where ads or other paid promotional content occupy more space than the publisher's own content. With affiliate links, ad units, and thin original explanation, paid-content share can become the risk even when no sentence is false. Add publisher content or reduce paid density.
Search features have separate hygiene. Product-integrated features must not be placed or worded to encourage accidental or deceptive clicks. The retrieved rules cite bait phrasing such as "click here for the best offer" and warn against making the unit the page's focal point. Related-search terms must resolve to relevant results. Reword units plainly and ensure clicked terms land on relevant results.
Pre-publish checklist
Run this audit first:
- Inventory every claim as fact, estimate, or promise.
- Apply the control test; delete or narrow outcomes the publisher cannot fulfill.
- Remove approval guarantees, "no credit check," and undelivered free or cash framing.
- Attach evidence to each number; remove unsupported figures.
- Match the referring ad or link to the page; match paid and organic views.
- Review audience and remarketing settings for negative financial signals and US/Canada limits.
- Check paid promotional share against publisher content.
- Reword search units, avoid bait calls and focal placement, and test related-search relevance.
These are editorial checks, not policy quotations, approval guarantees, or revenue promises.
What this evidence does and does not cover
Evidence here is Google publisher-compliance documentation, not card product data, pricing, approval odds, or outcomes. The retrieved policy copies are undated and localized, with Chinese text and English fragments; verify current English wording at the cited URLs. The credit-category restriction was partial and fragmented, so its exact boundary remains unverified. This is editorial compliance guidance, not legal or financial advice. Publishers running regulated credit advertising should seek qualified review and should repeat the audit as policies change.
研究の知恵