I’m sure that I am not the only person who noticed the color change on Google’s SERP page this week. For those who haven’t taken notice, the background color behind the top three positions in the Paid results has changed from a very light blue, to a pale yellow.

The underlying question remains… how will this affect my ads? One theory is that this area will suffer from Banner Blindness, the minds ability to block out ads on websites after being bombarded by them for so many years. I am not convinced that the paid ads will ever be affected by Banner Blindness when it comes to the majority of search queries.

Google users usually fall into one of two categories; those who are experienced with Google and understand the difference between paid, natural results, and those who just see results as results, and could care less where they come from. Both types of users click on these ads! Google’s advertising system is so well designed that the ads that it displays are usually equally (if not more) relevant than the natural listings.

Banner Blindness has occurred on the web because most banner advertising is irrelevant, annoying, and generally leads to a negative experience for the user. Google Paid Results are friendly, ultra relevant and often leads to positive user experiences, so this theory holds no water in my opinion.

I predict the increased visibility will lead eyes to this area of the page first, therefore resulting in a slight increase in click through rates (CTR), and an even slighter increase in conversion. Google is doing this to promote more clicks, which is in turn going to make them more money, and make advertisers (their customers) happier with an increase in CTR and Conversions.

As usual with Google, everyone wins.