Brand Defence: Who Is Bidding on Your Name in November

Branded search is the cheapest converting traffic you have, and November is when other people start buying it. Competitors raise budgets, affiliates chase commission on terms they did not create, and comparison sites expand their keyword sets into the peak window.

The work to defend it takes a few days and has to be in place before the account freeze in the week commencing 9 November. This post covers how to see who is there, whether bidding on your own name is worth it, and what you can actually enforce.

What is brand defence?

Holding the paid results on searches for your own brand name, so that someone looking specifically for you reaches you rather than an alternative.

It matters because branded search sits at the end of the journey. That person has already been persuaded, usually by activity you paid for somewhere else. Losing them at the final click means paying for the demand and handing over the sale.

The traffic is also cheap by the standards of the quarter. Branded terms convert far better than generic ones, which means the cost per order on brand defence is usually a fraction of portfolio cost per acquisition, running $33.01 across Cyber 5 in our accounts.

Why does it get worse in November?

Because the value of intercepting a decided buyer rises with the season, and everyone's budgets rise at the same time.

Three groups escalate. Competitors with peak budgets and a target to hit, who find your brand terms cheap relative to their generic keywords. Affiliates and coupon sites, who bid on "[your brand] discount code" and earn commission on a sale that was already yours. And marketplaces and retailers who stock your category, bidding broadly across the sector.

The pattern is reliable enough to plan for. Checking in late October tells you who is already positioning, and the set usually widens in the fortnight before the peak weekend.

How do you check who is bidding on your brand?

Start with Google's Ad Transparency Centre, which shows the ads an advertiser is currently running, and the auction insights report in your own Google Ads account, which names who else appears in auctions you enter.

Then run the searches manually, in an incognito window, on mobile as well as desktop. Mobile results show fewer positions, so an ad that pushes you below the fold matters more there than the desktop view suggests.

Check the full term set rather than just your brand name: brand plus discount code, brand plus review, brand plus alternative, brand plus the category, and common misspellings. The coupon and alternative variants are where the revenue actually leaks.

Should you bid on your own brand name?

Yes in almost every case during peak, and the argument against it is weaker than it looks.

The case against is that you would have won the organic click anyway, so the spend is wasted. That holds when nobody else is bidding. The moment a competitor or an affiliate appears, the organic result sits below their ad, and on mobile it can sit below the fold entirely.

Branded campaigns also give you control the organic listing does not: the offer in the ad text, the landing page, and sitelinks that take a gift buyer straight to the gift guide. During a promotional period that control is worth having.

Keep the branded campaign separate from everything else, because mixing branded and generic traffic in one campaign makes both unreadable, and inflates the apparent return of whatever campaign absorbs the brand clicks. That reporting problem is covered in Performance Max in Q4.

What can you do about a competitor using your name?

Less than brands expect on keywords, more than they expect on ad text.

Google's policy allows advertisers to bid on trademarked terms as keywords, so a competitor buying your brand name is generally permitted. Using your trademark in the visible ad copy is a different matter, and as the trademark owner you can file a complaint with Google to have it removed.

That is the practical remedy, and it takes days rather than hours, which is the argument for checking now rather than on 27 November. For the rest, the answer is commercial: outbid them on your own name, where your quality score advantage makes it cheaper for you than for them.

What about your own affiliates?

This is the leak most brands miss, because the traffic looks like it is working.

An affiliate bidding on "[your brand] discount code" is being paid commission to intercept a customer who was already arriving. You pay twice: once for the demand you created, again for the commission, and often a third time in the discount the code applies.

Check your affiliate terms for a paid search policy and enforce it before November. The standard clause prohibits bidding on brand terms and on close variants, and requires any trademark use to be approved. If your programme has no such clause, adding one now is a straightforward margin recovery.

What should be in place before the freeze?

Four things, all achievable this week.

A branded search campaign live and separated from generic activity, with budget headroom for the peak weekend rather than a cap that will exhaust on the morning of 27 November. Negative keyword lists that keep brand traffic out of your generic campaigns. Any trademark complaints filed, since they take time to process. And your affiliate paid search policy confirmed and communicated.

Everything structural should be settled before the account freeze two weeks out, which is set out in the peak season freeze calendar.

The wider commercial frame for peak, including what a customer can cost before the spend stops making sense, is in the Q4 Profit Playbook, free and written for founder led DTC brands on Shopify at $5M to $30M. Webtopia runs Google and Meta together for founder led brands as an ecommerce paid media agency.

Frequently asked questions

Can competitors legally bid on my brand name?

Bidding on a trademarked term as a keyword is generally permitted under Google's policy. Using your trademark in the visible ad text is restricted, and as the owner you can file a complaint to have it removed.

Is it worth paying for clicks on my own brand name?

During peak, yes. The spend only looks wasteful when nobody else is bidding, and on mobile a single competitor ad can push your organic result below the fold.

How do I find out who is bidding on my brand?

Use Google's Ad Transparency Centre and the auction insights report, then run the searches manually in incognito on both mobile and desktop, including coupon and alternative variants.

Should affiliates be allowed to bid on brand terms?

Generally not. An affiliate bidding on your brand plus discount code earns commission on a customer who was already arriving, so you pay for the demand, the commission and often the discount.

When should brand defence be set up for Black Friday?

Before the account freeze two weeks out, in the week commencing 9 November, and ideally in late October so trademark complaints have time to process.