Policy & compliance · also called Search partner opt-out, Parked domain opt-out
Advertiser opt-out (search partners / parked domains)
Advertiser opt-out is an advertiser's ability to stop its search ads appearing on partner sites, and in 2025 to 2026 on parked domains, outside the search engine itself.
Every search arbitrage click is paid for by an advertiser whose ad was syndicated beyond Google or Bing to a partner site. Advertisers have always had some say in this. In a standard Google Search campaign, the search partner network is a setting that can be switched off.
The bigger change concerned parked domains. Trade press reported in early 2025 that Google would opt advertiser accounts out of parked-domain placements by default, leaving a manual opt-in under content suitability settings. Google's own announcements page then confirmed the end point: parked domains (AdSense for Domains) ceased to be an ad surface within the search partner network on 10 February 2026, and the setting was removed.
Google has also given advertisers more visibility. Its announcements list site-level placement reporting for search partners (August 2025, for Search, Shopping and App campaigns), search-partner segmentation in Performance Max reporting (January 2026) and third-party pre-screened exclusion lists (April 2025).
The lesson for arbitrageurs: advertisers can now see where their clicks came from and leave. Feed revenue depends on those clicks being worth paying for.
Related terms
Search partner network
The search partner network is the collection of non-Google or non-Microsoft sites where an advertiser's search ads can appear through syndication.
Placement exclusion
A placement exclusion is an advertiser's instruction that its ads must not appear on a named website, app or category of sites.
AdSense for Domains (AFD)
AdSense for Domains was Google's programme for showing search ads on parked domains; Google removed parked domains as an ad surface on 10 February 2026.
Parked domain
A parked domain is a registered web address with no developed website, typically showing a placeholder page of ads or links.
Advertiser conversion
An advertiser conversion is the valuable action, such as a sale or lead, completed on the advertiser's own site after someone clicked their ad on a search feed.
Google Ads
Google Ads is Google's advertising platform, where businesses bid to show ads on Google Search, its search partner sites, YouTube and other properties.
Sources: Google Ads Help: Search partner network (SPN) announcements, Google Ads Help: Search partners, definition, Domain Name Wire: Google clamps down on RSOC as AdSense for Domains dies (November 2025)