Google has announced (April 17) it will be waiving ad-serving fees for eligible publishers on its Ad Manager platform for five months, in addition to launching an emergency relief fund for small or local newsrooms in an attempt to support publishers financially during the Coronavirus pandemic.
The search tech giant will be notifying eligible partners over the coming days about the initiative with Jason Washing, director of global partnerships – news at Google stating in a blog post that the move is one of the ways the Google News Initiative is looking to help publishers “reduce some of the cost of managing their businesses and funding important journalism during this time”.
“During times of global crisis, people rely on quality journalism to stay informed and safe. And the ads that appear alongside news coverage help fund the journalists who write breaking news stories and keep news sites and apps running,” he added.
Google’s announcement follows on from the Google News Initiative’s Journalism Emergency Relief Fund, which was launched last week to give financial assistance to small and medium-sized local news publishers worldwide. Publishers have until April 29 to apply for the funding.
“With these efforts, we aim to help news organisations reduce some of the cost of managing their businesses and funding important journalism during this time,” Washing concluded.