You might be concerned if running the URL Redirect Test will impact your Google or Facebook ads. The short answer is: URL Redirect Tests will NOT violate ads policy as long as you meet the platform’s requirements. In this article, we will go through the current ads policy and address potential concerns (Nov 1, 2024).
Google Ads Policy
Google’s Destination requirements mentions a principle called “Destination Mismatch“. You might be concerned with violating this specific ads policy when choosing to run an URL Redirect test. This will NOT be the case as long as the display URL on your ads is the same as the final URL. Therefore, make sure you are using the same domain in your ads and the redirected URL to meet this requirement.
Refer to Google’s example for more details:
Display URLs give people an idea of where they'll arrive after they click an ad. The landing page that you define with a final URL tends to be more specific. For example, if your display URL is www.example.com, your final URL might be example.com/sweaters.
Facebook Ads Policy
In Facebook’s “About Meta’s Unacceptable Business Practices advertising policy”, it is only mentioned that your ad’s landing page should be functioning properly and the content is relevant to your ad. Therefore, URL Redirect Tests will NOT cause a problem with your Facebook ads. While Facebook does not have a clear requirement for URL destination, refer to About destination links in your ad to learn more about Facebook’s definitions:
The display URL allows you to show a shortened link instead of your full website URL to make it easier for viewers to recognize the website. The link goes to the same domain as your website URL.
According to the above, you can also double check if you have the same display URL on your ad as the final URL to be on the safe side.
Conclusion
Rest assured that A/B testing with URL Redirect Tests will not violate ads policies. In addition to the requirements above, make sure the contents in your ad and the final URL can match up, confirm if the final URL is accessible, and always refer back to Google and Facebooks policy pages for the most up-to-date requirements.