Google Adsense Tips

by Paul on August 11th, 2004

To get up to speed on what Google Adsense is make sure to read Google Adsense.

If you are looking for tips on how to improve your performance in regards to Adsense then Google has posted a nice set of tips to get you started at .

Colors

I agree with all of the tips except for one. The one in question is #1: . From my experience I have found that Adsense ads that blend into your site and are less distracting to the user perform much greater than ads that are bright and draw the readers attention away from the content.

However, like any other program, your results may vary and with Google’s program it is very easy to experiment.

Provide Suitable Content

If you are running a blog you might be very tempted to place Adsense ads on your site. However, not every site was made for Adsense. If you run a more personally focused site then you might be better going with BlogAds or some other form of blog ad system.

Adsense works best on sites that have focused content. Matthew Haughey’s website, PVRblog, has a clear focus on PVR technology and because of this the ads are very focused. People visit his site to read about PVRs and if interested will click on the ads. This is the benefit of having contextual ads on your site that are focused on your audience.

Get the Content First

When you launch a site don’t immediately rush to apply to Adsense or put up their ads. Develop some quality content pages so that when you do apply you will be accepted into the program and the bot that searches your pages will have an idea of topics your site focuses on.

Focus on Traffic (aka Quality Content Pays)

The more people that visit your site the more page impressions your Adsense ads get. This in turn should lead to more clicks and more money. Focus on providing quality content on your site so that people will link to your site and continue to visit it. Again, more page impressions = more clicks = more money. It’s a simple equation.

Don’t Click Your Own Ads

I have met more than one person who has been dropped from the Adsense program due to “fraudulent clicks”. Google is smart. Don’t try to be smarter.

Also don’t encourage your readers to click your ads. This is expressly forbidden in the Terms of Service agreement you sign with Google. Make sure you read it and understand everything.

Don’t Disclose Your Earnings

Another great way to get dropped from the program is by disclosing publicly how much you are making from Google. Simple rule. Just don’t do it.

Use Alternative Ads

If you are finding that you are receiving Public Service Ads (PSAs) a large number of times, use alternative ads for when these show up. Google makes it easy simply by pasting in the URL of the image or ad you wish to use when a PSA is going to show. I like to use Affiliate Sensor for my replacement ads because they look identical to Adsense and can be customized just as easily.

Tags:

David James Nicol
Aug 16, 2004 at 7:07 am

Thanks for the tips.

I’m just getting into the world of Google Adsense with www.salmonrecipes.net. The site has been live for only a few weeks, but already I can verify that ads in subtle colours seem to work better than ones that are garish and bright.

I suspect that this is because people have become accustomed to identifying and ignoring advertising, meaning that an advert that blends in to a site is more likely to receive attention than one that stands out too much.

With regard to clicking your own ads, I did this once by mistake and was very worried that it might have resulted in me getting banned. I’ve not heard anything about this from Google yet, so I’m hoping that I will be OK. I assume that Google has some tolerance for genuine mistakes when it comes to this.

Thanks again.
David
Scrivs
Aug 16, 2004 at 1:14 pm

Yeah, Google does not get out of control till they see an adburd number of illegal clickthroughs. Also it seems they record your IP and are capable of ignoring the clickthroughs if they come from that IP.

If that is the case hopefully you do not set things up through an AOL account as many AOL users have the same IP address. But this is just all speculation.

As for the use of colors, any crazy colors tend to upset users while the subtle ones let them know that there are ads, but you are not trying to ruin the experience. This is why I feel they are so successful.
Andy Palmer
Dec 16, 2004 at 2:14 pm

Whats a good clickthrough rate ? Each day im roughly getting a clickthrough rate of 2-5% am i doing something wrong? www.andyproject.com any suggestions ?
Scrivs
Dec 16, 2004 at 2:27 pm

That’s actually a great figure. Can’t really expect anything higher than that and if you do get that it is probably fraudulent which will cause you to get banned.
JC
Dec 16, 2004 at 2:43 pm

wow, that is good. I get .4% overall, and about 1.5% from ForeverGeek.com (I have adsense on a fairly high-traffic forum that never gets more than a click or two a day so it skews my averages)
David James Nicol
Jan 20, 2005 at 7:35 am

Hello again,

FYI, With www.salmonrecipes.net we are averaging 7.7% clickthrough. That is from the launch of the site in August 2004 until now (i.e. for ‘all time’).

In the first two months after launch we sometimes saw a daily clickthrough of 25-30%, but that was admittedly when we were only getting about a hundred or so daily unique visits. Now that we are receiving a great deal more traffic, the clickthrough seems to have flattened out.

However, judging from what I have read I think I can still be very pleased to be getting 7.7% average.

Cheers
David
Scrivs
Jan 21, 2005 at 10:55 am

That is a CTR to die for man. Goes to show how well a targetted audience will react to relevant ads.
David James Nicol
Jan 21, 2005 at 1:50 pm

Thanks Scrivs,

I’m delighted with the clickthrough rate so far - I only hope that we can maintain this rate as the traffic increases.

I’ll keep you all posted.

Cheers
David
David James Nicol
Feb 14, 2005 at 9:17 am

Hi again Scrivs (and everyone else),

As promised, an update on http://www.salmonrecipes.net:

Clickthrough for 2005 is 8.5%; effective CPM is USD5.94. I’m really pleased with this.

What I’d like to know is if anyone can provide an explanation for the wild variations I see in the CPM. One day it was only USD1.53 but a couple of days later it was USD26.50.

Anyone got any ideas why this happens?

Cheers
David
Scrivs
Mar 31, 2005 at 4:45 pm

This happens usually because the higher paying links are not showing due to inventory runout or some other factor as keywords on the page.

If you get a couple of clicks from people clicking on just the right high-paying ads your eCPM will obviously be higher than when they end up clicking the lower paying ones.
Matt
Dec 12, 2005 at 5:26 am

We pretty much just opened and have a Click through Rate of 7.5% I guess thats pretty good? If only I could get some real traffic or even some consistant traffic. Seems like people come post ads and never come again. We are very new though. This is my first web site and hope it gets huge someday. Anyone have any suggestions for me?
Matt
Feb 24, 2006 at 7:36 pm

Things Going great now! Lots of traffic. Don’t need any help!
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