Joel Comm and AdSense Account Closures

Contrary to good blogging practice, this is my first post on this blog for a few weeks. Unfortunately I've been busy setting up a new business and moving to a quaint old thatched cottage in the English countryside. Many topical news stories have come and gone during my hiatus but there is one that I just cannot resist commenting on.

One of the big news stories of recent weeks was the closure of several AdSense accounts that were based on MFA (made for AdSense) sites and AdWords arbitrage. However, for me the biggest aspect of that story was the hypocrisy of AdSense guru Joel Comm when he blogged about this topic. To quote Mr. Comm:

What did those publishers do wrong?

They had either built their site specifically for AdSense or they'd been practicing AdSense arbitrage (buying traffic cheaply from one place then selling it on to AdWords advertisers through their AdSense units.)

What both those practices have in common is that they put the ads ahead of the content.

That's just wrong. Google is making a good move for advertisers in drawing the line.

I'm certainly fed up clicking search results and finding myself on a page full of ad links instead of the content I want. And advertisers are fed up paying for clicks from people who aren't really interested in their services.

Do you see the blatant hypocrisy? No? Well, let me enlighten you. First, take a look at these 2 web sites run by Joel Comm, InstantAdSenseTemplates.com and SuperAdSenseTemplates.com. What are these sites selling? MFA web site templates! That is, Joel himself sells templates to create the very type of sites that he is disparaging in his own blog post. If that isn't hypocritical I don't know what is.

To make matters worse, I left a comment about this very issue on his blog but, of course, it didn't pass his moderation. That's the second time I've left a critical comment on his blog that he has refused to publish. Guess he's more concerned about protecting his online empire than actually being prepared to face honest, valid criticism.

I've had issues with Joel for quite some time (see this post and this one), now I've concluded that he's just a shallow money grabber and a hypocrite to boot.

Tags: adsense, opinion, joel comm

New Look for the AdSense Home Page

I just went to log into my AdSense account and noticed a new design for the home page. I'd noticed the design a few days ago but it then reverted to the old look. Below is a screenshot.



Interestingly enough, after logging out and going back to the home page, I got the old style page again. I wonder if this page will completely replace the old one soon!

Update: This new design has now permanently replaced the old AdSense home page

Tags: adsense

Pre-Populating AdSense Search Box Queries

I've often seen people asking in AdSense discussion boards whether they are allowed to pre-populate the search box when using AdSense for search. In case you don't know what that means, it simply means putting some predefined text in the text box that you would normally type in before clicking the "Search" button.

Well, in a post entitled "If it ain't broke..." on the official AdSense blog, this question was definitively answered earlier today:

our program policies strictly prohibit altering the layout, behavior, targeting, or delivery of Google ads or AdSense for search boxes . . . includ[ing] . . . [p]re-populating the AdSense for search box with specific queries.

So, there we have it. Don't pre-populate your AdSense for search text boxes or you could find yourself banned from AdSense.

Tags: adsense

Blend Your Ads for Higher Click Thru Rates

A recent study by MarketingExperiments.com, "How Matching Ad Design to Context Improved Conversion by 127%" (available as an online Web Clinic in Windows Media and Real Player formats) has established what AdSense users have generally believed to be true, that blended ads generally perform better than ads that stand out from the site's content.

"Blended ads" are ads that use the same font, color scheme, etc. to the site's main native content. The study showed that blended ads "performed significantly better" than non-blended ads in both CTR and conversion rates.

The authors also suggested that the main reason for the increased performance is the effect of "ad blindness" when non-blended ads are used. As well as matching fonts and colors, the authors also suggested that, for maximum performance, any logos etc. used in the ads should be "small enough not to shout 'advertisement' so loudly as to be blocked by the subconscious 'ad filters' of content site visitors."

This study isn't exactly breaking new ground since blending ads has been recommended by Google and authors such as Joel Comm for a long time now. However, it's good to see some empirical data to support this. It's also important not just for AdSense (etc.) publishers but for advertisers who place their ads on handpicked sites - including advertisers using image ads. Thus, if you are advertising on site www.somesite.com, make sure that your ad is designed in such a way that it blends into the site's native content for maximum performance.

Tags: adsense

Why It's Not Worth Putting Competing PPC Ads Alongside AdSense Ads

I frequently read questions on various AdSense discussion forums regarding whether or not you are allowed to put ads from other PPC programs, such as AdBrite, Bidvertiser, Clicksor, etc. on the same page as AdSense ads.

In this post I'll discuss why I don't think this is generally a good idea anyway. However, first, what exactly are the rules governing this situation?

AdSense Rules Regarding Competing Ads

The rules governing competitive ads and services were amended earlier in 2007 and now read as follows:

In order to prevent user confusion, we do not permit Google ads or search boxes to be published on websites that also contain other ads or services formatted to use the same layout and colors as the Google ads or search boxes on that site. Although you may sell ads directly on your site, it is your responsibility to ensure these ads cannot be confused with Google ads.

In various places, Google has also stated that if the competing ads naturally have a similar look to Google ads, they must use a distinct color scheme to clearly differentiate them from the Google ads.

Thus, you can now use pretty much any competing ad program alongside AdSense provided they are visually different, even if the competing ads are contextual, which was formerly prohibited. Of course, you also need to make sure that the competing ad program permits AdSense to be used alongside their own ads!

Why It May Not Be a Good Idea

There are 4 main reasons why I think it is generally not a good idea to display competitive ads alongside AdSense. However, I want to begin with a proviso. I do not consider in-text ads as being competitive ads. By this, I mean such ad programs as Kontera, Intellitxt, etc.

So, here are my reasons:

1. Poorer Quality Ads
Many of these competing programs simply have poor quality ads, as compared to AdSense. They don't necessarily follow the same editorial policies that Google requires of its ads and often just look tacky. However, this definitely does vary from program to program. Also, the format of some AdSense competitors' ads is not good. For instance, Element Ads often truncates the title of the ad when it is wider than the ad width. Thus, you may see ads for "Bicycle Shelters and R" or "Lake Tahoe Mountain Cabi," for example, where the end of the ad title is missing.

2. Lower Paying Ads
In my experience, AdSense competitors tend to have lower paying ads both in terms of the average cost per click and the click-thru rate. For example, on one site of mine, I earned more than 10 times the amount with AdSense in about 6 weeks than I earned from Bidvertiser and AdBrite during a period of several months. (Note: AdSense was not run alongside Bidvertiser and AdBrite).

3. Competing with AdSense
This kinda goes without saying . . . but if you have other ads on your page that are competing with your AdSense ads, you are going to get less clicks on your AdSense ads. If the AdSense ads tend to pay more per click, why compete against them?

Another issue to consider here is that of payment threshold. Suppose your competing program has a $100 minimum payout requirement, like AdSense has. By running the two programs side-by-side you are going to take considerably longer to reach the payment threshold, even if both programs perform equally well. Now, if you're a high-traffic, high-earning site, that's not an issue, but I know there are plenty of AdSense publishers out there struggling to reach $50 in earnings, let alone the $100 minimum! Can you really afford to wait perhaps twice as long to get paid?

4. AdSense is More Than Adquate On Its Own
In my opinion, you really don't need competing CPC ads because you can already place more than enough AdSense units on a page anyway. Under the current rules, you can place 3 ad units (which may each contain up to 4 ads), 1 link unit, 2 search boxes, and 2 referral units per product. That's potentially an awful lot of ads to appear on a single page!

Of course, if you're unhappy with the performance of your AdSense ads, feel free to try other programs, or test their performance against your AdSense ads. However, in my opinion, AdSense is by far the best contextual PPC program available.

Tags: adsense

Google PPA Ads: The Pros and Cons

As you've probably already read elsewhere, Google recently announced a limited beta test of its new Pay-Per-Action ads. This new pricing model will initially only be available to U.S. advertisers and the ads are only going to be shown on AdWords' Content Network, that is, as AdSense ads.

Under the PPA pricing model, publishers will only generate income when a customer completes an action that the advertiser has predefined, such as making a purchase, signing up for a newsletter, etc. Each action is assigned a value by the advertiser and part of the price the advertiser pays goes to the AdSense publisher.

As part of this new pricing model, Google is also introducting a new type of advertisement: text link ads. This is in addition to standard text or image ads.

So, what are the pros and cons of this new form of AdSense advertising for you, the AdSense publisher?

Pros

More Control
Google's PPA advertising model has four characteristics that provide greater control and choice for the publisher:

1. Publishers can choose whether or not they want to have PPA ads on their web sites.
2. Publishers can choose "between an individual ad, a shopping cart of ads, or a specific term or phrase that is relevant to their site’s content."
3. The introduction of the new "text link ad" format gives publishers more flexibility in the type of ads being served.
   
4. Finally, before the ads start to be served to their sites, publishers will be able to "view the specifics of the ad, including company name, logo and products or services being sold."

I think point 2 is of particular importance. It is a frequent complaint of (newbie) AdSense publishers that they have no, or little, control over the ads being displayed on their sites. With the PPA model, publishers will be able to choose specific ads to display, or ads pertinent to keywords of their choice. This is potentially a big plus for the PPA pricing model.

Potential for Greater Earnings
This "pro" is certainly more uncertain and tenuous than the issue of greater control. However, because the advertiser can place a fairly accurate value on the action, they should be willing to pay considerably more per action than they would pay per click because, in reality, only a certain percentage of clicks ever leads to a conversion for the advertiser.

The issue of clicks and conversions also raises another important point to remember. Under the CPC pricing model, if clicks on the Content Network are less likely to lead to a conversion, the publisher's income per click is reduced as a result of Google's Smart Pricing methodology. Thus, PPA ads are a way of avoiding Smart Pricing.

Cons

Uncertainty and Risk
By far the biggest issue on the negative side with PPA ads are the issues of uncertainty and risk, particularly with regards to income. Because this pricing model is new, it will take time for prices to reach their optimum levels, such that they are attractive to advertisers but still providing a decent income to publishers.

Also, and by far the most obvious issue, is the fact that publishers will only earn when an action is completed. This will therefore put pressure on the publishers to ensure that such ads are displayed on pages that are likely to be read by customers actively looking to complete such actions. Thus, PPA ads are more likely to succeed on, for example, product review pages, than on purely informational or educational pages. Thus, it is going to be risky for publishers to place these ads on their sites without any way of assessing the likelihood that clicks will lead to conversions. This is particularly true of pages that are already generating a relatively decent income on a CPC basis.

Minimizing the Risk
So, given the riskiness and uncertainty of PPA ads for the publisher, how can this risk be minimized?

1. Have you Been Smart Priced?
If you have been an AdSense publisher for a while, analyze your income per click over time and see if it has gone down. If so, that means you have probably been "smart priced." That is, clicks on ads on your site(s) are generally not converting well. In this case, PPA advertising is probably not a good choice for you unless smart pricing has so siginficantly reduced your income per click that the value of a single conversion would exceed your CPC income within the time needed to get a conversion in spite of smart pricing.

2. Analyze Your Site's Content
Take the time to analyze your site's content with regard to the action the advertiser is trying to achieve. Are visitors to your site likely to be seeking to do what the advertiser is hoping for? Is your site's content very specific to the content of the ad and its associated action?

If you can answer "Yes" to these questions, PPA ads may be a good choice for you.

3. Test
Test PPA ads on a small section of your site as a trial. Make use of AdSense Channels to analyze the performance of the ads and compare their performance against (1) non-PPA ads on other parts of the site during the same time period, and (2) the peformance of non-PPA ads on the same section of the site prior to the switchover to PPA ads.

4. Are You Unhappy with your CPC/CPM Income?
If so, then PPA ads may simply be worth the risk!

Tags: adsense, ppa

Update: If you are interested in reading the pros and cons of AdWords PPA advertising from the advertiser's perspective, read my blog post on the subject.

Putting AdSense Code in External Files

If you are managing a web site comprised of several pages and you would like to be able to add AdSense code to the site without having to paste the exact same code into each and every page, there are two main ways this can be achieved.

Include Files

Dynamic page building technologies such as ASP, ASP.net, PHP, and SHTML allow code that is common to multiple pages to be stored in an external file and incorporated into the main page with a single command.

For example, if you were using ASP you could place your AdSense code in a file named i_adsense.asp (the i_ prefix indicating an include file. Note: It is not good practice to name ASP include files with a .inc extension). In order to include this file in your main code, you simply use the command

<!--#include file="i_adsense.asp"-->

Similarly, in PHP you use the command

<?php include("i_adsense.php") ?>

External .JS Files

Using this method, you simply place your AdSense javascript in a file that has a .js extension, such as adsense.js, and reference this file in your main code, wherever you want the AdSense ads to appear. To incorporate the external .js file in your code, you would use the command

<script language="JavaScript" src="inputmasks.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

Note, the src attribute can contain a full path or absolute URL, such as js-files/inputmasks.js or http://www.mywebsite.com/javascript/adsense.js.

Is this method permitted?

There seems to be some confusion as to whether external .js files are permitted. In order to clarify this situation, I recently contacted AdSense support and this is how they responded

You're welcome to include the AdSense ad code in .js files, but please don't modify the code or manipulate the ad targeting in any way, as this is against our program policies.

Thus, as long as you don't alter the core JavaScript code in any way, it is perfectly acceptable to make use of external .js files.

Limitations of these Methods

External files make managing your AdSense code across many pages much simpler. This is particularly useful when you are using a template that allows for an ad unit of the same size in the same place on every page in your site. However, this is not without its limitations.

The single biggest issue with this is that it makes the use of precise channels much more difficult. For example, supposing every page has a leaderboard at the top of the page that is in an external include file and you want to include a unique channel for every page's leaderboard. If you had no other AdSense ads on the page, you could make use of URL channels, but what would you do if you also had a skyscraper unit on your pages? How would you differentiate the two?

By incorporating programming techniques into your external include files in ASP, PHP, etc., even this is possible, but is beyond the scope of this post.

Tags: adsense

How to Tell If You Are Getting CPM AdSense Ads

Confusion still reigns regarding CPM AdSense ads, as I've discussed in my previous "AdSense Nonsense" post and elsewhere. I'm also still reading advice that if you place large AdSense ad units on your site, you're more likely to get CPM ads. So, how do you get CPM ads, indeed, what are CPM ads, and how can you tell if you are getting any on your site?

What are CPM Ads?
CPM ads are advertisements that are part of Google's AdWords program for which the advertiser pays per 1,000 impressions rather than per click. Thus, they are the only type of AdSense ad that pay you for impressions rather than clicks. However, even though your AdSense reports are showing relevant impressions, you may not get any associated earnings because an advertiser may be paying as little as 50 cents per 1,000 impressions, which is the equivalent of only $0.0005 per impression!

How Do You Get CPM Ads?
This is really very simple-you get CPM ads on your site if an AdWords advertiser, choosing to advertise with CPM ads, handpicks your site to advertise on. As AdSense help states:

Advertisers running CPM ads . . . select the specific sites on which to show their ads, and pay each time their ad appears.

Source: What are CPM ads? AdSense Help Center.

In the world of Google AdWords, the flip-side of AdSense, these ads are known as "site-targeted ads."

How Can You Tell If You Are Getting Any CPM Ads on Your Site?
You can very easily verify whether you are getting any CPM ads on your web site by using functionality built into AdSense's advanced reporting mechanism. Simply follow these instructions:

1. Log into your AdSense account
2. Click on the "Advanced Reports" link under the "Reports" tab
3. For the "Choose product" drop-down, make sure "AdSense for content" is selected
4. For the "Show data by" drop-down, mak sure you select "Individual Ad"
5. Check the box immediately below the "Show data by" drop-down, labeled "Show data by targeting type - contextual or site"
6. Select the Date Range you want to check for
   
7. Click the "Display Report" button
8. In the report results, you should see a column labeled "Targeting." If you are getting CPM ads, for some (or all) days you will see the word "Site" in this column, with a value in the "Ad Impressions" column. Any days that do not have a "Site" value as well as a "Contextual" value in the "Targeting" column did not get any CPM ads. (Note: "Contextual" in the "Targeting" column refers to the standard cost-per-click ads.)
   

Using this report, I can see that I had some CPM ads on March 3, 4, 5 but none on March 2 or 6.

Technorati Tags: adsense

Untargeted Ad Spotted on this Blog

The screenshot below shows an AdSense ad that I spotted on this blog earlier today.

Does that look like an ad targeted to this site ... or an ad that someone thought would do well on a site with this blog's subject matter?

So much for Google's ad targeting technology!

Google Related Links Are Not AdSense

I just came across a couple of blog posts (this one and this one [update: second blog post was removed by its author]) about how Google is testing a new tabbed ad unit for AdSense.

Now, I may be wrong, I have been plenty of times before, but I don't think this has anything to do with AdSense whatsoever. Rather, these bloggers are confusing an entirely different Google tool with AdSense. That tool is Google Related Links.

Admittedly, they do look a tad like AdSense link units but they are designed to "use the power of Google to automatically bring fresh, dynamic and interesting content links to any website."

What's more, you don't earn anything by having them on your web site, no matter how often those links get clicked on!

Technorati Tags: adsense, google related links

AdSense and AdWords CPC Site Targeted Ads

Google has recently announced that they are going to be beta testing CPC site targeted ads. Site targeted AdWords ads are currently the single source of CPM (cost per impression) AdSense ads, whereas most AdSense ads work on a CPC (cost per click) basis.

So, what this means for AdSense publishers is that, in future even fewer ads will earn you anything for impressions alone. However, in my opinion, the chances of an advertiser handpicking your site to advertise on is pretty slim anyway and, as I've discussed previously, very few AdSense publishers ever see a CPM ad on their sites, so in practice this change will have only a minimal effect on AdSense publishers.

Technorati Tags: adwords, adsense

AdSense and Exchange Rates

I realized that I've never seen anyone blog about this issue before but I think it's an important one that needs to be addressed.

Does Google allow for current exchange rates when calculating AdSense earnings?

This issue is premised on a few basic facts:

1. All AdSense earnings are calculated and reported on in U.S. dollars
2. AdSense ads are ads from the AdWords content network, which are paid for (and bidded on) in local currency
3. People browsing sites containing AdSense ads get ads served to them based on their geographical location

So, here's a scenario.

I am in the U.K. which currently has an exceptionally favorable exchange rate against the U.S. dollar. I have various web sites serving AdSense ads. If someone from the U.K. visits one of those sites, some of the ads they see may well be from advertisers whose target audience is solely within the U.K. Thus, if one of those British ads gets clicked on by a British visitor, is the current exchange rate taken into account when my AdSense earnings are calculated?

At the moment, the same ad on the same site should be worth more to me, all other things being equal, than it would have been a year or two ago because of prevailing high value of the G.B. pound against the U.S. dollar.

If you have any thoughts or information on this topic, please leave a comment.

Technorati Tags: adsense

Why You Can Explicitly Encourage Clicks on AdSense Referral Ads

Google has just published an interesting post on the Inside AdSense blog entitled, "Referral policies - clarified," which explains why publishers are allowed to explicitly endorse the referral products (i.e., encourage clicks on them!) when they're not allowed to do so for regular AdSense ads.

The post gives 2 main reasons.

The CPA Nature of Referral Ads

Because referrals require the user to actually do something (the action) before the publishers gets paid by the advertisers, the advertiser will always get what they're after even if the publisher encouraged the click. For example, you won't get paid for any clicks on a referral ad for Firefox unless the person who clicked on the ad actually installs Firefox on their computer. In this case, the advertiser is happy, they got what they wanted, so they're happy to pay up!

Endorsing a Specific Product

When you endorse a referral ad product, you know exactly what product you are encouraging your visitors to click on. This is not true of ads that appear in regular AdSense CPC ad units and, as such, if you encourage visitors to click on those ads, you cannot possibly be doing so with any real knowledge that the products or services being advertised are of value to the visitor.

My Thoughts

I think in many ways this is a very sensible policy, however, as the post also points out, it must be remembered that you still cannot encourage visitors to click on referral ads "for deceptive purposes." In fact, unless you have actually used the product yourself, you cannot possibly genuinely endorse the product with any real knowledge of it.

Thus, this policy is still open to blatant abuse and I personally think the CPA nature of referral ads provides only a limited level of protection to the advertiser because many of the products being referred cost the user nothing.

It will be interesting to see if Google eventually changes this policy for free referral products.

Technorati Tags: adsense

HTML for AdSense Publishers: Aligning Left, Right and Center

This is the first in a series of posts intended to provide AdSense publishers (and, indeed, anyone else using other similar services) with some basic HTML knowledge that will help them display their ad units correctly.

This first post looks at how to align your ads to the left and right and how to center the ads.

Left Aligning

Left aligning is the default way that ads will be displayed, however, if your ad unit is contained inside a page element that is centering or right-aligning its content, you will need to manually left-align. To do so, you can implement either of the following methods:

1) The old-fashioned and now "deprecated" method is as follows

<div align="left">
... your code goes here ...
</div>

2) The better way to do it, using styles is

<div style="text-align:left;">
... your code goes here ...
</div>

(Alternatively, if you're familiar with CSS and external style sheets, you can simply assign a class to the div tag that has a style of text-align:left - but that's another lesson for another day!)

Right Aligning

Right aligning is basically the same as left-aligning, only you simply replace left with right!

1) Thus, the old-fashioned method is:

<div align="right">
... your code goes here ...
</div>

2) Or the better way to do it, using styles is

<div style="text-align:right;">
... your code goes here ...
</div>

Centering

Again, centering is basically the same as left-aligning, only you simply replace left with center!

1) Old-fashioned method is:

<div align="center">
... your code goes here ...
</div>

2) Or the better way to do it is:

<div style="text-align:center;">
... your code goes here ...
</div>

Note: These techniques only align the ads within another page element. If you want the ads to be on the left or right but have other content wrap around them, you need to "float" them ... which will be the subject of the next post in this series.

Alternatives to AdSense: Kontera

Introduction

Kontera is a contextual advertising system that examines your site's text for keywords. It then transforms some of those keywords into hyperlinks that, when you hover the cursor over them, display advertisements. You get paid a certain amount every time one of those ads is clicked on.

Thus, Kontera is:

• Contextual advertising
• Pay per click advertising
• In-text advertising

Or, as Kontera puts it,

[Kontera works using] ContentLink™s, [which] are contextually relevant keywords discovered in real time on a publisher's web page that are automatically turned into a link to the most relevant and highest paying text ad from one of Kontera's thousands of advertisers.

Sign Up Requirements

According to Kontera's web site, in order to be eligible as a publisher, your web site must generate more than 500,000 page impressions per month, be primarily in English, and have more than 50 words per page on most of the site.

However, my experience with Kontera is that they are often happy to work with sites generating far less page impressions. Indeed, when I registered with them, the site I was publishing their ads on did not receive anywhere near that amount of impressions!

My Experience of Kontera

So far, in terms of payout, Kontera is currently second only to AdSense. However, it has still fallen way short of my AdSense earnings.

Another issue that I recently had (in fact, I'm still having!) is that I have been unable to implement Kontera's code on any of my Blogger.com blogs. I have tried every method I can think of to do so, but they have all failed.

As a result, I contacted Kontera support and received a fairly quick reply (less than 48 hours). However, the advice was not very good. In the email, I was also told to let them know if I still had problems. So, I wrote back to tell them I'd tried everything they'd suggested but with no joy. This email lead to the biggest frustration I've had so far with Kontera--their reply didn't even acknowledge or seem to realize that I'd already written before on this issue and, what's more, they didn't actually address the problem I was having with implementing the code but simply told me I needed to use different code on each of my blogs. This, of course, I not only knew but had already been emailed the unique code blocks a few days earlier, by Kontera. I am still waiting for their response.

Finally, Kontera's reporting mechanism often seems to have issues where they fall a few days behind. This happens frequently enough that it makes me feel uncomfortable but it always catches up in the end. However, it does sometimes make me wonder if it under-reports my actual earnings.

Competitors

The main competitor to Kontera is Intellitxt. This has similar sign-up requirements to Kontera but, in my opinion, is less open to smaller publishers. I also personally just plain like Kontera more - I prefer the format of their ads and the actual advertisers. However, Intellitxt generally seems a tad more popular than Kontera.

Conclusion

Kontera is definitely a worthwhile addition to any web site owner hoping to generate extra income, provided you have text-heavy site. As compared to AdSense, my rating would be a generous 6 out of 10.

To learn more about Kontera, read the ebook Kontera AdLinks Secrets (aff).

Technorati Tags: kontera, adsense

ShoeMoney's AdSense Interview

Jeremy "ShoeMoney" Schoemaker has recently interviewed Brian Axe from Google AdSense and made the entire interview available in MP3 format.

The interview covers such topics as the recent changes in the Program Policies, being banned from AdSense, Smart Pricing, and more!

This is a must-hear AdSense interview.

Technorati Tags: adsense

How Google Targets AdSense Ads

There is a lot of speculation about how Google actually targets AdSense ads. Does it read the keywords meta tag? Should you put keywords in b(old) tags? What about em, strong, or i(talic) tags? Does font-size matter? What about the title tag? And so on.

To make matters worse, I regularly read messages from supposed AdSense experts stating with apparent authority that most of the above really do make a difference, particularly the meta keywords and b tags. So, do these things really make a difference?

Well, the answer to that question was recently supplied by a Google employee and I have kindly been given permission to share that information with you, courtesy of the direct recipient, Jon of Cobnut Web Services.

However, before we take a closer look, we need to examine what we already know from official sources about how Google targets AdSense ads.

What Google Says About Ad Targeting

In AdSense's help pages you will find the following in answer to the question, "How does Google target ads to my website?"

We go beyond simple keyword matching to understand the context and content of web pages. Based on a sophisticated algorithm that includes such factors as keyword analysis, word frequency, font size, and the overall link structure of the web, we know what a page is about, and can precisely match Google ads to each page.

In addition, according to AdSense help, the only method of emphasizing some text over others, and having other text ignored, is by the use of Section Targeting.

Thus, we can conclude from official sources that the factors affecting ad targeting include:

1. Keyword analysis
2. Word frequency
3. Font size
4. Link structure (overall, web-wide)
5. Section targeting

However, many of those terms are pretty vague. Do "keyword analysis" and "word frequency" include the keywords meta tag, for example?

One point that is of great interest though is that font size is listed as a factor. I can only assume that this is true whether the font size is declared using font tags or CSS's font-size. Thus, it appears that words in a larger font may be given more emphasis than those in a smaller font. It is also my opinion that this applies mostly to headings and sub-headings that incorporate a larger font, not simply using a large font size for keywords that appear in the middle of sentences (if you see what I mean!).

What Has Been Shared With Me About Ad Targeting

Much of the information I received simply repeats the information above but it also contains a few hidden gems:

Our technology takes into account factors such as linguistics, keyword analysis, word frequency, font size, and the overall link structure of the web. AdSense only targets ads based on overall site content, not keywords within the meta tag or categories . . .

[i]f you'd like to display ads related to specific topics on your website, we recommend including more text-based content about these topics on your site to assist our crawlers in gathering information about your pages and determining relevant ads to display. Complete sentences and paragraphs are helpful to our crawlers in determining the content of a page. (Emphasis not in original.)

So lets, take a closer look at those gems.

Google Does Not Target Ads Based on the Keywords Meta Tag

AdSense only targets ads based on overall site content, not keywords within the meta tag

So, it is the overall site content that counts and not meta tag keywords. This is a very important point because it implies that you should be able to get ads that are relevant to your site even on pages that have low textual content provided there is sufficient text on the site as a whole.

Google Needs Text-Based Content

Now, this piece of information isn't exactly a surprise or new, but it's good to have it re-emphasized by Google that AdSense is contextual advertising with an emphasis on the text! If you don't have text, you won't get targeted ads.

Google Needs "Complete Sentences and Paragraphs"

Thus, if you want well-targeted ads on your site, you don't just need text, you need text that is comprised of complete sentences and paragraphs. That doesn't mean that Google cannot ascertain context from "telegram-style" bullet points or any other text but it does mean that the more keywords you have in complete sentences and paragraphs, the more accurately targeted your ads will be.

Summary

So, if you want highly targeted ads on your site, make sure your follow the following guidelines:

1. Put keywords in larger font-sizes (probably headings/sub-headings, etc.)
2. Try to ensure that pages linking to your site incorporate your keywords inside the hyperlinks
3. Use keywords inside internal hyperlinks (i.e. hyperlinks between pages of your own site)
4. Employ section targeting
5. Ensure there is sufficient "keyword-rich" text across your site as a whole
6. Make sure that your keywords are contained in complete sentences and paragraphs

Technorati Tags: adsense

Sick of Inside AdSense Video Posts

As you've probably already figured, I'm not happy with all of the video posts that keep appearing on the official AdSense blog, "Inside AdSense." The latest post, "Laura Chen answers your referrals questions" contains the following teaser:

Laura addresses these burning questions:

1. Why am I receiving less than the full amount for each conversion in my reports? Is something wrong?

2. After I've referred a person to AdSense, can I see how much they've earned so far?

3. Can I ask users to click my referral buttons?

The post goes on to mention how you can find further information on referrals in the AdSense Help Center.

So, what is my problem with these video posts, and this post in particular? One simple word: accessibility.

Video posts are great if you have a decent computer with speakers and you can hear - but what if you can't hear?

I am shocked and dismayed that in this day and age, Google doesn't provide a transcript of the video that is linked to from the post itself. As an accessibility advocate, I think this is appalling.

What makes this even worse is that at least 2 of the questions in the "teaser" are not answered in the AdSense Help Center. How frustrating is that!

Shame on you Google.

Technorati Tags: adsense, accessibility

Joel Comm's Monthly Templates Violate AdSense Program Policies?

In the Program Policies for AdSense, which all AdSense publishers must adhere to, you can read the line:

No Google ad may be placed on pages published specifically for the purpose of showing ads, whether or not the page content is relevant.

The well-known Joel Comm, author of "The AdSense Code," sells from his web site AdSense templates, which are basically ready-built web sites, content and all, whose purpose is solely that of generating income via AdSense ads.

That sounds like a Program Policy violation to me.

So, I left a comment on his blog post in which he promoted his monthly templates. I mentioned this program policy and my opinion that his templates possibly violated the AdSense program policy. Now a few days later, my comment has not been posted and, of course, he has left no reply.

That troubles me. I'd mentioned in a previous post entitled "Joel Comm or Joel Con?" that I had my concerns about Joel, now I'm more concerned than ever.

So, in order to assuage my concerns, I wrote to AdSense support to inquire as to whether or not such templates violate the program policies and I received an interesting response:

I understand that you would like to know on whether using a certain template complies with the program's policy. However, we do not endorse or encourage the use of any third-party tools.

We recommend that you exercise caution when using third-party software to ensure that you do not violate the AdSense Terms and Conditions. Please note that AdSense participants are solely responsible for verifying that any tools or software used in conjunction with AdSense do not violate the AdSense Terms and Conditions.

So, if I were you, I would not use any pre-built web site templates, whether they are from Joel or anyone else for that matter.

You have been warned!

Technorati Tags: adsense, adsense templates, joel comm

Finnished With AdSense?

So, I was looking at my Internet Marketing and SEO Blog earlier today when I noticed the following AdSense ad:

Now, my blog is written entirely in English. I am sitting here at my computer in the U.K. yet I'm being served an AdSense ad for SEO in Finnish! I have a feeling it won't be the most popular ad being published on my blog.

Go figure!

Technorati Tags: adsense