A look inside Google AdSense
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Bye, bye, beta...
If you've logged into your account in the past couple days, you might've noticed that Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT for short) is officially out of beta. So what's changed? Our process for verifying bank account information has improved.After you submit your bank account information, we will place a small test deposit into your bank account for you to keep. Once you see this test deposit credited to your account, just input the amount of the deposit into your AdSense account to help us verify your bank account information.
Testing your bank account before we make your payments means a greater chance of an error-free deposit. From now on, if you choose to use EFT, you can rest assured that we're taking the steps to make your payment successful.
We're excited about this launch and want to thank all of you who took part in our beta testing phase. We appreciate your help.
And many more...
While we work to support you, we always appreciate your support, too. On Tuesday many of you sent us some very cheerful birthday wishes and we thought we'd share one of them with you:Hello! Dear Sirs,
First of all we would like to congratulate you on Google's 7th Birthday. We wish all the best and wish you to stay on the top as world's Best search engine! Keep on this good work!
Best regards,
HITECHHOST.NET Team
A warm thank you to all of you who wrote in and granted our birthday wish: to keep making our users happy for many more years to come. Now, who wants some leftover cake? ;-)
Bloggggggger
We've just made it a lot easier for Blogger users to make money with their blogs. Our new integration with AdSense lets you sign up from within Blogger. And we've added a tool for inserting the ads in your blog (so you don't have to mess around with HTML). There are even built-in options that will analyze the colors on your blog and choose a recommended color scheme. Check out the mad science, why don'cha.Tuning in to your feedback
As a member of the AdSense support team, I help publishers with everythingfrom optimizing their ad implementation to understanding the AdSense payment schedule. With the wide range of incoming inquiries and concerns, we are always looking for ways to better understand what's most important to our publishers.
Recently, I had the opportunity to work on a team with engineers and product managers to help redesign our "Ads by Google" page – the feedback page users land on when clicking on the "Ads by Google" link on each ad unit. Using your feedback and aiming to improve our response time, we added categorization buttons so that users can tell us if they are providing feedback about Google ads, AdSense publishers, or something entirely different, like how they enjoy exploring the Grand Canyon with Google Earth.
So far, we're seeing positive results with the new Ads by Google page, and we hope you like it. The new page allows us to quickly know if you love the Little Bow Wow Rap ad on your site, or if you are interested in a new feature. This helps us to understand and prioritize what is most important to web users and our publishers, and what features we should focus on implementing in the future. From time to time we may experiment with new designs to continue making this a more useful page - stay tuned.
Preventing leaky filters
Creating effective Competitive Ad Filters is easy as long as you follow a few simple guidelines. Here are some quick tips to improve your filters:Tip 1: Don't use "www" in your Ad Filters
Ads should be blocked at the domain level. Frequently, publishers append "www" to their filters, such as using 'www.example.com' instead of 'example.com'. If you filter 'www.example.com' and the ad points to landingpage.example.com, the ad will continue to appear on your page. However, filtering 'example.com' will block ads from 'landingpage.example.com', 'example.com/subdomain', and 'www.example.com'.
Tip 2: Don't believe the myth about blocking 'low-paying advertisers'
Our auction system automatically selects the best performing ads for each page to help you earn the most possible money. This is especially true with our new expanded text ads. By filtering ads you think are low paying, you could actually be cutting out the most optimized ads and decreasing your revenue potential. Each ad that is filtered is one less bid in the auction, lowering the price for the winning ad on your site. You benefit most when there is a larger pool of advertisers competing for a place on your site. Additionally, when we calculate the auction, we take ad clickthrough rates (CTR) into account - an ad with a $0.25 cost-per-click (CPC) with a 5% CTR is more valuable than an ad with a $1.00 CPC but a 0.1% CTR.
Learn more about how the auction works.
Tip 3: Don't go overboard with filters
Only filter URLs when absolutely necessary. As mentioned, each URL you add to your filter list may cut into your AdSense revenue potential, so it's important to think carefully before deciding what to block.
Some publishers worry that competitive ads will affect their bottom line and they may overuse filters, limiting the ad inventory available for their site. Our advice? Test it. Some publishers don't use filters and sell at the same levels after adding AdSense to their pages. This might not be true for all publishers, but you should test first so that you know the actual effects before unintentionally reducing your AdSense revenue.
Tools of the trade
They say you learn something new every day. Today, maybe that something can be a new way to improve your website. Google has more tools for website publishers, so you can focus on creating content while we help with everything else. Recognize traffic trends on your site with Urchin. Or, add some interactivity with Blogger. Have some video content? Give Google Video a try to get the visibility it deserves.If you're hungry for more ideas, visit our publisher tools site. Take advantage of the tools that make sense for your site, and you just might learn something in the process.
See things before they happen
Wish you could see your AdSense ads before pasting the code on your pages? With the Google AdSense preview tool for Windows Internet Explorer, you can. Even publishers who use the preview tool aren't always aware of all its useful features, so we decided to highlight a few gems:Filter more efficiently – You don't have to wait until AdSense ads are on your page to block any unwanted ads from appearing. It’s quick and easy to preview your site’s ad inventory and add URLs to your Competitive Ad Filter list.
Test color schemes – You can preview your ads using a selection of color schemes, helping you to visualize how AdSense will look on your pages.
Experience geotargeting – Do you wonder whether your users in India are seeing the same Google ads as users in France? With geotargeting, AdWords advertisers choose specific countries they want to target. Then, AdSense determines where your users are located based on their IP address and serves geographically targeted ads accordingly. The preview tool allows you to see your site's ad inventory for a variety of locations.
Please note that if you're a newly approved AdSense publisher, the preview tool may not display relevant ads until your site content has been indexed by our crawler. This means you may have to run the AdSense code on one or two pages of your site before trying out the preview tool.
From the Inside AdSense mail bag
Amy asks: I just pasted the Google code into my travel site, but the ads I'm getting are public service ads. Why is that?Inside AdSense says: If you’ve just pasted the code on your site, our crawlers need some time to gather information about the content of your page. For the first 48 hours after you put the code on your site, public service ads (PSAs) might show up, but you should expect ad relevance to increase over time.
If you do not see your ad relevancy improve within 48 hours, check that your page has enough text-based content for our crawlers to determine relevant ads to display.
If these tips don’t seem to apply in your case, you may find it helpful to learn more about PSAs so you can determine other reasons you may be seeing these types of ads.
Clarence asks: Why won't the ads show up on my site? I copied and pasted the Google ad code from my account, and I could see the code appearing between the tags in my site's HTML source code. When I looked at my live website, though, no ads showed up at all. I tried to paste the AdSense code into my site a second time, but the AdSense code appeared as text on my live page. Help!
Inside AdSense says: If you can see the code within the tags of your site's HTML source code but no ads show up on your site, you’re still on the right track.
First, double-check that you’ve copied the ad code exactly as it appears on the Ad layout code page of your account and pasted it into your source without any modification. Some web design programs automatically insert extra line break tags into the HTML code, or you might’ve accidentally removed a piece of the AdSense code when pasting. If the ad code is altered in any way, ads may not appear.
The second time you tried pasting the code, it sounds like something else might’ve happened involving the HTML editor you used to create your web page. If you’ve pasted the code into a 'what you see is what you get' (WYSIWYG) editor, this will often result in the Google ad code appearing as text on your live site.
For the ads to appear correctly, you'll need to copy and paste the AdSense ad code into the HTML code view of your page rather than into the WYSIWYG view. In your editor, this might be labeled as 'Code view', 'HTML view', or something similar. Some editors don’t have an HTML view and use an 'Insert HTML' function to paste HTML instead. If you're unsure where to paste the code, we recommend using our HTML troubleshooting guide or contacting your HTML editor's customer support center for assistance.
Reports done your way
You can customize hamburgers, search results, and the ring of your cellphone whenever your mom gives you a call. But can you customize your AdSense reports? You bet. Even better, you can view the customized reports at any time with just one click. Here's how:On your Advanced Reports page, create a report with a variable date range (e.g. "yesterday", "today", etc.). Choose any combination of channels or just aggregate data to view all channels, then make a selection between page impressions or ad unit impressions.
Generate the report, and you'll notice a new text box appears above it. Type a name in the box and click "save". That's it - the report you've named will appear on your Overview page in the Custom Advanced Reports section and you can view it at any time with one click.
We hope this will free up the time you used to spend selecting the same set of channels over and over, so you can spend it doing other things - like customizing your AdSense ad color palettes.
Feeds fixed
Recently, we received emails saying that our feeds were not working properly – thank you for letting us know. We looked into it with a cool tool called, Feed Validator. It seems that we goofed and had added some invalid HTML. We’ve gone back and cleaned up those posts, and we have confirmed that the feed is now fixed.Mobile Sitemaps answers the call
Back in August, we recommended using Google Sitemaps to help Google crawl your content pages. Since then, Sitemaps has been updated to support mobile website URLs. We know that more users are searching the web from their cell phones and more publishers are creating web pages designed specifically for mobile devices. So, you can now use Google Mobile Sitemaps to tell Google about your new and changed mobile web pages, and increase your coverage in our mobile web index. (Incidentally, you can search through these mobile-specific websites using Google Mobile Web Search on your phone.)Good news for HTML newbies
You've signed up for AdSense. You've activated your account. You've chosen your ad format and colors. Now you're ready to paste your AdSense ad code into your site. Or are you? If you're new to HTML, you might find it a bit challenging to add our code into the HTML source of your pages. ("HTML source--what's that?")Have no fear - our new Troubleshooting Demo is here! I've worked with other members of our support team to create an HTML Troubleshooting Demo that should help clear up the confusion so you can see the ads on your site without delay. The demo addresses many common issues new publishers face when adding the code to your site, including instructions for pasting the ad code using two common types of design software. It also provides a background on HTML, information on viewing your page source, and tips to address the top four problems faced by new publishers.
If you've used our demo, we welcome your feedback.
Prescription for G.A.S.S. relief
Now that stats are back up again, your G.A.S.S. is probably flaring up as well. We'd like to use this opportunity to introduce a "cure" to the syndrome. The new version of Google Desktop has a plug-in called 'AdSense Status'. This feature allows you to continuously monitor your AdSense earnings and avoid the hassle of logging in to your account every 15 minutes.
Of course, in order to treat your G.A.S.S. you'll first need to download the new version of Google Desktop. Then you'll need to go to the plug-in page (see example above) to download the AdSense Status feature. It's fast, easy and fun – and we hope it will cure your G.A.S.S. permanently.
Distorted Images
I’ve heard some ugly rumors circulating about image ads, and I want to separate the myths from the facts so publishers don’t miss out on an important revenue opportunity.Myth: Image ads take too long to load and I hate those ‘Shoot the Duck’-type ads
Fact: We have strict guidelines for both animated and static image ads restricting them to a maximum size of 50 kb, so they’ll load quickly on your site – and no Shoot the Duck ads allowed!
Myth: Image ads don’t pay as well as text ads
Fact: All ads served by AdSense – whether image or text, contextual or site-targeted – go through the same auction process. Opting into image ads maximizes your site’s revenue potential by allowing a greater pool of advertisements to compete for space on your site. Image ads will only appear if our technology determines they will be more effective than any other ads for a particular page.
Myth: Image ads aren’t relevant.
Fact: When serving contextually-targeted ads, we use the same algorithm to match ads to your content whether image or text ads appear. With site targeting, an advertiser has determined that their ads are specifically relevant to your users (see example below).
So, here are some recommendations:
1) Under your ‘My Account’ tab, make sure that ‘Ad Type Preference’ is set to ‘Display text and image ads in all ad units’. Then, when generating your code on the ‘Ad layout code’ page, I recommend checking ‘Use my default account setting’ under ‘Ad Type’ (see example below).
2) Check the HTML source code for each page where you are running the AdSense ad code to make sure you have opted into both text and image ads (i.e., google_ad_type should be set to “text_image”)
3) Make sure you are using an ad format that supports image ads to take full advantage of this option.
4) Test the image ad option on a small subset of your pages for at least 2 weeks and track the progress using URL channels or a custom channels. This will allow you see whether image ads are effective for you. More data means that you can make educated decisions about your site. Try image ads and see the results for yourself.
Temporary G.A.S.S. Relief
Speaking to AdSense publishers at face-to-face events and in reading emails and forums, we on the AdSense team have seen a phenomenon develop that's probably best described as G.A.S.S. - Google AdSense Stats Syndrome. The primary sign of affliction is the compulsive need to check AdSense stats every 15 minutes or so to see how much you've earned since your prior login. Sufferers face strong withdrawal when separated from a PC with Internet access and have been known to experience mild abdominal discomfort and general irritability.So for you G.A.S.S. sufferers, we will offer a bit of temporary summer relief this Thursday. For some scheduled maintenance, our reports will not be (visibly) updated for around 6 hours beginning at 12 noon PST (GMT -8 for you international folks). Your earnings will of course be unaffected, but you won't see any change in stats during this time as we work to improve the AdSense system.
Please enjoy the day and rest assured that things will be back to normal as soon as possible.
Playing a small part
Echoing the sentiments Kim posted last week, a member of our team recently suggested that we use PSAs to increase awareness of the Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. Our team agreed that this was a great idea and we worked together to make it happen. Starting last Friday, all of our PSAs began directing help to specific charities aiding those affected by Hurricane Katrina.A note for the weekend
This Labor Day weekend I’d like to send my best wishes to all those affected by Hurricane Katrina. This is a part of the country I visited often growing up and have always loved. Please know that we at Google are thinking of everyone in the region.Link up
If you'd like to offer your readers something different in the way of relevant content, give link units a try. Link units offer a unique design and implementation that can adapt to your site and your readers' interests.Each link unit displays a list of topics relevant to the content of your site, and when users click on one of these topics, they're brought to a page of AdWords ads related to that topic. Though you won't receive earnings for clicks on the topics, you'll be paid for user clicks on any of the AdWords ads on the resulting page.
Link units are available in several adformats designed to complement your site's layout. You might wish to place a horizontal link unit near a horizontal navigation bar (see the example above). Or, you could use a vertical link unit near a sidebar navigation menu (see example below).
For even more effective placement, we suggest creating a color scheme for your link unit that blends with the background of your site.
UPDATED: formatting
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