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Wednesday 1 April 2009

Google's own AdSense Tips

Google is at least as interested as you are in having your ads perform well on your site. And they've gone to some work to provide the information you need to optimize your AdSense.

What's fascinating to me is that apparently not everyone bothers to read their tips. And even some that do, fail to apply it.

That said, you need to be aware that simply using their tips doesn't guarantee successful ads and decent CTR (Click Through Rate). How many times have you heard this? You have to test. You have to try alternatives and see what really works best for you, on your pages, with your content and your visitors. Test, test, test some more. Track your results, analyze them, try variations. Too many of us don't test. We hear the mantra, but we don't do the work.

First, let's see if we can get an idea about location. (The graphic is included in the article on my site or you can take a look at it at the Google link included below) Generally, above the fold, at the top center of your content, below top navigation is the hottest location. Not immediately below which is good but not quite as hot. In a left sidebar, to the immediate left of primary content or below the primary content are also good. Most other locations are generally cooler.

Again, you need to test and you need to consider your users behavior - and their behavior may vary on different pages with different kinds of content. Google suggests that in some cases, such as articles, the best location can be at the end of the article. To quote Google, "It's almost as if users finish reading and ask themselves, What can I do next?" Well targeted relevant ads right there can provide the answer.

Don't blindly assume that sticking a nice big rectangle in the center above the fold will do it. It may, but depending on your content, it may annoy or inconvenience your users.

Users tend to focus on content, navigation and to a lesser extent graphics. Positioning your ads near these elements will often work well -- if those ads are targeted to your visitors needs.

The top three performers among the Google ad formats are the 336X280 large rectangle, the 300X250 inline rectangle and the 160X600 wide skyscraper. Google reports that the wider formats tend to do better than the taller ones. One reason may be that these are, perhaps, easier to read since they have fewer line breaks and require less eye movement. But, you need to use formats that fit your pages well. Once again, you need to test, but redoing your pages to suit a particular ad format may not be a reasonable alternative and you may discover that a different format actually gets better results.

Now we come to color. Conventional wisdom says that colors which tend to blend into your content do better. Some go so far as to suggest that colors which make the ads look like part of the content are best. Personally, I think anybody really believes those ads are anything but ads, but who knows. Google suggests that you may find that colors that standout from your content do better - or maybe the opposite. This is absolutely an area where you need to test alternative color schemes. Going with the conventional wisdom usually works fairly well, but without testing you could be leaving a lot of money on the table.

Google allows you to have up to three ad units and one link unit on your pages. If you have long pages with lots of text, can only use small ad units or are in a niche with a large ad inventory, multiple units can pay off. Keep in mind that the way ad serving works is that the higher value ads are delivered to the first ad unit block encountered in your code. Always make sure that this first ad unit is displayed in the best location (yeah - test). You want the higher paying ads to be in the prime hot location on your page. Weaker locations can get the lower priced ads. And if none are available, then nothing will display unless you've included an alternate ad URL in your Google code. To maximize monetization you should be including alternate ad URLs, especially if you are putting multiple units on a page. The use of an alternate ad URL also eliminates the possibility of being served PSAs (Public Service Announcements). It's your real estate, maximize your returns.

Nothing here is secret. Except for using the alternate ad URL, all of this information is available from Google's Optimization Tips page - http://www.google.com/support/adsense/bin/static.py?page=tips.html . You can buy books and courses, visit a dozen forums and, in the end it comes down to what your visitors do on your site. The best you can get is general guidance. This means averaged outcomes over many sites, many types of content. If you are serious about doing whatever you can to really optimize your AdSense returns, there is only one thing to do - test. Whether it's AdSense, opt-ins, copy, headlines - anything with a measurable outcome that you can track - then the way to improve is to test and keep on testing.




About the author:
Richard writes, teaches, trains and consults on business and professional presentations and eCommerce related matters. For more information on eCommerce sites and eCommerce site building visit http://www.building-ecommerce-websites.com- and you can find more articles at http://www.building-ecommerce-websites.com/articles.

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Monday 30 March 2009

AdSense is Stupid When...

There are times Google's heralded ad affiliate program isn't in your long term business interest. Oh no I said it!

AdSense isn't the unstoppable revenue engine for every eBusiness. Before I am taken out and flogged by the eCommerce pundits -- please let me explain what I mean in my defense.

I make revenues from AdSense at a very high click-through rate. I experience high click-through rates with AdSense without resorting to questionable tactics like tricking site users with photos (the AdSense trick and tip dujour).

So my perspective is from one who has made decent income from AdSense to fund aspects of his business like advertising seminars -- and outsourcing to his virtual assistants. Yes, AdSense is a legitimate and significant revenue source. However evaluate AdSense with some type of balance.

By now you may have heard about people like Joel Comm's six figure income with AdSense, or Jason Calacanis of Weblogs being on his way to generating 1 million dollars in AdSense revenue. Google's Ad revenue sharing affiliate program for publishers certainly seems to be an eSales Nirvana for many webmasters.

But there are obvious and not so obvious times not to use AdSense ads on your sites. Let's list - examine - and explain them below.

1. On Sales or Mini-sites

This is a no-brainer. If you are trying to sell a particular product that is important to your bottomline, you don't want AdSense ads distracting your customers from either joining your email list, or hindering your site's online sales process.

However I do see hybrid sites that are mini-sites or full scale eCommerce sites, with AdSense at the bottom of their pages. This might not be so bad since only 1% - 15% of your site visitors will either buy from you or fill out a form.

The thinking with this approach is you might as well make money from disinterested parties using up your server's bandwidth.

2. SEO Business Sites

If your livelihood depends on search engine optimization or marketing for a living you might want to think twice about displaying AdSense Ads on your site. I can tell you this from personal experience. I once was on top of MSN for search engine marketing in my local area. I concentrated on my local area because I found people felt more comfortable hiring an eCommerce consultant locally.

One day my site fails totally out of the MSN index. After intense study I noticed that I obviously had a filter on my site from MSN.

I analyzed all the top ranking sites in MSN and noticed the only difference between me and the other top ranking sites was I had Google AdSense ads on my site. Someone at MSN felt that my AdSense ads, and perhaps to a less extent, my book on SEO, was getting a free ride in the MSN search engine database.

In fact I noticed that there were no sites with AdSense ads for at least the first 3 pages. Plus the sites with AdSense were only using 1 ad unit at the bottom of the home page (there were very few of them in the top 5 pages).

I knew it was strange to not have AdSense ads on the top Internet marketing sites. This prompted me to scan other industries where I noticed the same trend.

Many of the leading SEO gurus have sites that have been banned from the top listings by the search engines. It seems the more visible you become, the more of a target your sites are to the search engine auditors.

Some of my sites are still on the top of MSN with AdSense ads but that doesn't mean they won't also be targets in the future.

Let's face the facts. MSN and Yahoo! have competing ad networks to Google's, and this competitive situation is rife for a potential backlash against SEO sites with AdSense ads.

Many SEOs will point to exceptions to this position. However you have been warned!

Think about it, how long will MSN and Yahoo! sit back and watch SEO driven websites use their search indexes to fund Google? Did you know SEO in MSN and Yahoo(!) --- is much easier to obtain.

Therefore optimized sites are creating an ad sales wealth transfer from MSN and Yahoo into the pockets of Google! It won't be long before Yahoo! and MSN begin to devalue ranking on AdSense sites in their databases -- if not outright ban them.

If you are in the search engine business stay search engine neutral, or create multiple sites for different search engines.

3. When AdSense Becomes Your Only Business Model

When you become so myopic in your thinking that you build a business solely on AdSense revenue -- think again my friend. Why build a business solely on the largess of Google?

I don't know if your realize it or not, but the sites making the real big AdSense money usually have a following that doesn't depend on the search engines. Internet mavens like Chris Pirillo or Joel Comm have been on the Internet a while and have followings for their websites. Therefore they can consistently make six figures with AdSense.

These content powerhouses are an asset to Google and not the other way around. But do you think Google is going to sit back and watch just anybody make big bucks off of their top rankings?

If you do a search on most keywords you will notice many of the top ranking sites are news sites, .gov sites, or .org sites these days. The only exception is in industries where these sites don't really exist like eCommerce industries (clothing, shopping, etc.).

No doubt in most industries you will notice a conspicuous scarity of AdSense sites in the top rankings. In other words don't bet your future fortunes on AdSense.

An IPO based on projections of AdSense revenue isn't in the future for the average eBusiness. Think of Google AdSense as supplemental income. Building a business solely on AdSense revenue isn't just silly -- it's just plain stupid.



About the author:
Kamau Austin is the publisher of over ten websites. See more of his eCommerce and Search Engine Commentary can be found at:
http://www.eInfoNEWs.comand http://www.SearchEnginePlan.com

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Sunday 29 March 2009

6 steps to Adsense Domination

When you make your living online, you realize the need for multiple streams of income.

One of the easiest and most lucrative ways to generate a secondary income, which also happens to be passive, is via Google’s Adsense program.

I’m sure you’ve read the claims of a few individuals generating five figure monthly incomes from Adsense. For many of you, I’m sure you are wondering why you aren’t making this same income yourself.

Well, wonder no more. If you follow my simple six step system, you will be well on your way to healthy Adsense profits within three months.

Are you ready? It’s now time to pay attention.

Step 1 – Preparation

The key to making money with Adsense is all about numbers. BIG numbers!
Sure, there are a few people making serious money with less than ten sites, but these are the exception. Your goal will be twenty-four sites in three months. That’s just TWO sites per week!
In order to accomplish this, I recommend one of the many available page generation tools available today.

Step 2 – Determine Your Markets

In order to maximize Adsense income with only twenty-four sites, you must know which markets are paying well.
To break this down even further, you need to know which keywords within those markets are paying the most.

Step 3 – Register you domains

Once you’ve identified and chosen your markets, you must register domains appropriate to those markets. For example, if your market is ‘Cabbage Patch Dolls’, a domain such as http://www.cabbage-patch-doll.com/ would be appropriate.

Step 4 – Create your site

Using your favorite page generation software and keyword list, it’s time to develop your site. There are several key points to bear in mind when you develop these specifically for Adsense.

1. Format – Always use the large 336x280 large rectangle.
2. Border – Match the same color as your background.
3. Background color - Border – Match the same color as your background.
4. Link = "0000CC"
5. Color_url = "999999"
6. Color_text = "333333"
7. Position – Far left or center and just above the page fold (Top 25% of site)

Step 5 – Verify and track your site

Visit your site and make sure all links work and that the sites appear to your satisfaction. You should also check out the ads Google is displaying. Are they targeted to your primary high paying keyword? If not, recreate your site using your high paying keyword in a higher density throughout your site.

Make sure you track your Adsense format, position, and traffic with a tracking system specifically designed for Adsense. Once you know your stats, you can adjust for maximum clickthroughs and higher revenues.

Step 6 – Get your site listed in the search engines

This is simple… no tricks involved. Simply rent links to your site. A PR7 or PR8 link will do the job. While I’ve simplified the process here, you are now armed with enough information and resources to make some serious money with Adsense.




About the author:
This article has been authored by Keith Baxter, the founder of http://www.topkeywordlists.com
If you want to maximize your Adsense income and learn how to drive massive amounts of traffic to your website from the search engines, visit the site now. Only 203 spots are available at the special low introductory rate.

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Thursday 26 March 2009

Adsense and the Surfer

AdSense is an easy program to grasp: it's a great form of an advertising bringing a lot of benefits to every person in the chain. And of course, seeing the results it can have on a business (and a publisher) people encourage this form of publicity.

For the browsing audience this is probably the most straightforward model available, because they can be directed to a lot of new sites they wouldn't have otherwise found. Needless to say, if you have an AdSense banner on your site, and a large number of visitors you'll know it offers a great financial benefit.

But why does it work for the people clicking the links, as opposed to a standard approach?

It is aided by today's society. With bloggers and information based articles on the internet, people may be encouraged to complete purchases, which adsense can provide links to relevant suppliers whilst also benefiting the publisher.

And the good thing about this is that it works for site visitors as well. In fact Google realized that by pleasing the people who are looking for something, and directing them to what they need faster, everybody wins.

It is because of this that a lot of websites promote through AdSense in both content and search. They do it because they ultimately learned that it works for everyone.

If we look in the past, we can realize that this kind of publicity has a great impact over the people, especially in the last few years. When we enter on a web site and we see a graphical banner, our first idea is to cancel it out of our mind, because it's of no concern to us.

That's why traditional banner advertising is wrong. It's precisely because people are becoming savvy that they don’t look at a flashy banner because they think they'll be losing their time with it.

We've gotten accustomed to banners that don't interest us. And we're accustomed to them having nice graphics. So we naturally associate the two things and think that a banner with nice graphics has nothing to tell us.

But we might look at a text-ad because we've grown accustomed to them being targeted at what we're looking for. Basically these advertisements have marketed themselves into being looked at by any visitor.

This is a typical "no fluff, just stuff" situation. And in the end it means the visitors will see what they're interested in, not some random cool graphics you throw at them.

As stated above, site visitors adopt this advertising mechanism, because it is efficient in leading them to pages of interest and can offer ton of things they really want to see. Someone coming across an article on adsense was probably looking for shoes or doing research on shoes when they came across the article.

And most importantly for everyone, including visitors, this scheme can only improve as the process gets further refined to make ads more relevant to what you're looking for, not just a couple of keywords on a site.

Nowadays, it is because of AdSense that Internet surfers are looking after more interesting related things from banners, and the companies behind the site (Google and the advertiser) need to have better ideas to display, as expectations have increased a great deal.

So could "Do no evil" actually work in today's cut throat competitive marketplace? Well, as you can see it can and it does. And you, as a visitor are the one who gets to enjoy this the most. Advertising becomes less of a burden and more of a benefit, and is still a benefit you can choose to ignore.

Less obtrusive banners; banners that you're actually likely to be interested in and click means you'll be less annoyed by surfing the web and feel like you as a visitor being offered a relevant service.

Although some may feel reluctant to read articles that are there purely to compel consumers, undoubtedly without this consideration they are useful. Ultimately the adverts mean that you don’t have to go back to your homepage every time you are compelled to complete a purchase.






Sunday 22 March 2009

When AdSense Goes AWOL

No matter how hard you work to optimize your page, there are going to be times when Google just can’t figure out which AdSense ad to deliver, so it defaults to delivering a PSA (Public Service Ad) instead.

Now I don’t have any problem with charities, but I give to the ones that I choose to give to. Since I don’t have a non-profit license of my own, the goal of my web site is to make money and I depend on Google AdSense revenues to help pay my bills. Someday I want it to fund my retirement as well, so I can’t afford to have non-revenue PSAs showing up on my site.

The good news is the Google understands the human’s basic greedy nature, so it provides us with an alternative to donating our precious web real estate to charitable organizations. That alternative is known as AdSense Alternate Ads.

As strange as it seems, this feature allows you to let Google competitors into your site. Don’t worry, Google is allowing it with their eyes wide open. They even tell you how to set up the alternate ad code to work on your site and they let you do it right in your AdSense control panel.

Once you add the code to your site, Google will pull ads from whatever service you defined rather than serve a PSA. Google will do that even if those ads are coming from Yahoo, or Overture, or your grandmother’s attic.

This goes a long way towards ensuring that you never lose an opportunity to monetize a visitor’s time spent on your site. How nice it is of Google to gives us that opportunity.

Who do you choose?

Ah, now that’s the big question. Most people head straight for Overture or Yahoo, but there are other fish in the sea worth considering. In fact, some of these fish make their living almost solely by serving replacement ads for PSAs. Run this search (http://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official_s&hl=en&q=google+psa+alternatives&btnG=Google+Search) on Google and you’ll have plenty of options to choose from.

Why bother?

Sometimes Google doesn’t have any ads in its inventory to match your site’s keywords. Sometimes Google gets confused and can’t figure out which ads to deliver, so it grabs a PSA ad.

Google also has a not-so-readily-available list of what it calls “stop words”. When the Google AdSense spiders detect these words on your page they automatically trigger PSAs. Some of the more commonly known words include severe profanity (think: George Carlin’s 7 Words You Can’t Say on T.V), as well as other words which may very be quite legitimate for your site such as pharmaceutical, drugs, death, dying, abortion, and the list goes on and on. At least we THINK that it goes on and on but no one really knows for sure outside of a trusted few Google staffers.

But no matter what the reason, you don’t want non-revenue ads running on your site. There’s no excuse when Google makes it so easy to keep the revenue flowing.



About the author:
Diane provides marketing and internet profit tips.
For more Google AdSense tips, visit http://www.adsense.deeljeabiz.com
Email : deeljeabiz@gmail.com


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Saturday 7 March 2009

Where’s the best place to put Google Adsense Ads?

Why, on your web pages of course. Ok, just kidding. The real question should be: “Is there really any truth to the rumors that where you place those Google AdSense ads can actually improve response?” According to my best information, the answer to that question is: Yes.

Google’s own AdSense experts say that that there is a direct correlation between the placement of the AdSense ads and the resulting clickthrough.

When ads are placed in “content zones”, rather than in “advertising zones”, response rates on Google AdWords goes up. There are also indications showing that ads appearing on the right side of the page get clicked more than ads appearing on the left side.

Advertising analysts with degrees in human behavior and psychology have spent thousands of man-years (people-years?) studying how people read printed and Internet content and what it takes to get them to respond to ads. While some of these studies are proprietary, or are only available to anyone with $10,000 or more to spend on a copy, other studies have been made public and can be read by anyone who is interested.

Google themselves has released some relevant information which is focused directly on increasing your Google AdSense response. You can read their findings here (https://www.google.com/support/adsense/bin/static.py?page=tips.html).

Of course, all of the studies in the world aren’t worth a hill of beans if the findings don’t work on your web site. That’s why it is important to test, test and test again. Experiment with your Google AdSense placement and track the results over a period of time. Google provides response tracking tools in your AdSense control panel. Learn how to use them. As you begin to see what may be only subtle differences in response, you’ll be able to determine what works best for your particular site. But don’t get complacent. What’s working for you now might not work next month if you change your site design or content.

One of the most important factors in determining placement of your ads is the type of content that your site delivers. If you are primarily an e-commerce site, and you have a lot of pictures and ad copy for your own products competing for attention against AdSense ads, then it is going to be a particularly tough challenge getting any kind of decent Google AdSense clickthrough. It is situations like this that require very thorough testing and a lot of trial and error.

Blogs seem to have a lot of success generating high response rates to Google AdSense listings. Perhaps it’s because blog readers realize that ad revenue is the only way that their favorite blogmaster can keep the lights on, so the readers think of clicking on ads as a way to make a donation.

Regardless of what the experts say, your best bet is to tailor your Google AdSense ad placement to what your own experience shows works best for you. In the end, you’re the only expert who matters.




About the author:
Diane provides marketing and internet profit tips.
For more Google AdSense tips, visit http://www.adsense.deeljeabiz.com
Email : deeljeabiz@gmail.com





Wednesday 4 March 2009

What makes Google AdSense system so special?

The basic arrangement in which Google AdSense system works is such that Google has the basic control over the Ads that are displayed on the websites subscribed to Google AdSense system. Of course, the website owner can customize how an Ad looks and also block/filter certain types of Ads on their website. The Ads that Google serves are ‘Senseful’ Ads (these Ads are actually relevant to the topics that the website discusses/ caters-to). This is something that is not found in other advertising programs/systems. This creates a win-win situation for everyone.

The people who are visiting the website (that contains Google AdSense Ads) are doing so because they are interested in the product/service/topic that is discussed on that website. It would be of little use to them if you were to serve Ads that are not related to the topic in any way. On the other hand, Ads related to the topic of the website would really prove useful to the visitor. They might actually be interested in a product or service that is being advertised through Google AdSense Ads. So, website visitors get a richer experience due to AdSense program.

Website owners get revenue for displaying the Google AdSense Ads and for the clicks they receive on the Ads. So, they are happy too. As far as businesses/advertisers are concerned, they get a system (AdSense system) for targeted advertising that is both easy and economical to operate.

Moreover, Google AdSense Ads are presented in a much better way than the banner Ads or other types of Ads. Most of the Ads are simple text Ads that are clear and concise. The website owners find it easy and the advertisers find it easy too. Google AdSense is really one of the best advertising programs available today.






Sunday 1 March 2009

Treble your Adsense Income in 60 MInutes

Google's Adsense is one of the most powerful weapons in website publisher's arsenal. It enables you to monetize your sites easily and if used properly can generate a very healthy income. However, if you're not using it properly and maximizing the income you squeeze from it, your leaving money on the table – something we all hate doing.

Boosting your return from Adsense can be done very easily and quickly, and you'll be amazed by the results.

I ran Adsense on my sites for over a year before I discovered these techniques, and like many people, I though I was doing pretty well. My click through rates and CPM figures were very healthy, and I didn't honestly think that they could be improved a great deal. How wrong I was. Immediately after I implemented a few quick changes my click through rate more than doubled, and by doing some fine tuning I manged to get nearly three times as many people to click on the ads as had been previously doing so.

The first technique is one that was 'discovered' by the amazingly helpful Debs, on SiteSell's SBI! forums. When I read it originally, it made sense and I decided to goive it a go, but I wasn't prepared for the immediate impact it would have on my income. It involves making only a few simple changes to the format and positioning of your Adsense ads.

Firstly, forget about using banners or skyscrapers. These ad formats are almost universally ignored by surfers. Why? Because we've all been conditioned to recognize a skyscraper or banner as an advert and as these adverts are rarely of any interest, we ignore them. What's needed is a way of integrating Adsense ads into the editorial on your site as seamlessly as possible. To do this you need to do three things:

1. Use the 250 x 250 rectangle format
2. Make the background color of the ad the same as the background color of your site, or as close to it as possible.
3. Make the ads border less by setting the border color to be the same as the background color of the ad.

These changes can be made by logging into your Adsense account and creating a custom format. Just select the 250 x 250 ad format, and create a custom color palette. Use the color picker to pick the coor you want. The JavaScript is automatically generated at the foot of the page, ready for you to copy and paste into the pages on your site.

Now, you need to position your ads where surfers are most likely to click on them. Research using retina scanning technology has shown that the place that surfers tend to look at first and most often is the top left. I don't know the reasons for this, perhaps it's because that's where we're used to seeing the most useful search engine results (at the top of the rankings) and search engines are the sites we most often visit, so we automatically look at the same place on other sites.

Whatever the reasoning, as soon as I made the above changes to my Adsense ads, click through rates doubled, immediately.

The second technique is much newer and one which is entirely based on my own experience. Google has recently added a new type of Adsense format, called Ad links. This displays a series of links on your page in the same style of Ad unit as regular Adsense ads. When a user clicks a link they are taken to a page of adverts that resembles regular Google search results. As a publisher, you are paid every time a user clicks one of those ads.

Adventurous soul that I am, I jumped in with both feet and started to trial Ad links on my most visited pages as soon as it was launched. I'm using the four links in a square box format, positioned top left of my page content. After a few weeks of running Ad links alongside regular Adsense ads, it's clear that the return on Ad links is about a fifth to a quarter higher than regular ads. There's no clear reason for this but one explanation may lie in the fact that clicking on an Ad link takes the user to page of 'results'. When a user clicks on one of these, you are paid for the click. If the user finds what they want, great, if not, it seems that they hit the Back button on their browser and try again, just as you would for normal search engine results. Then they click on another result, and you get paid again. So it's possible to be paid more than once from the same Ad link click. Now, this reasoning is speculative, but it does make perfect sense in the light of my Ad links results.

Finally, Adsense has some excellent tracking statistics that allow you to track your results across a number of sites on a site by site, page by page, or just about any other basis you choose. This is a very powerful tool and you should use it to find out which ads are performing best for you and fine tune your Adsense and Ad link ads accordingly.

So you see, by spending an hour or so of your time making a few adjustments to the Adsense ads on your sites, you can very quickly treble your Adsense income. Give it a go, you'll be amazed by the results.




About the author:
Kenny Hemphill is the owner and publisher of The HDTV Tuner and has been using Adsense for two years.
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Friday 27 February 2009

Adsense is for Everyone

When Google's AdSense appeared, there were a lot of people who doubted Google's idea would be marketable and actually generate any profits. Yet as we stand here today it's probably the most well known pay per click venture in the world.

Yes, all those nay sayers ended up eating their own words in the end. And that is because the folks at Google never go and do something without assessing whether or not it will be profitable, or exactly how profitable it is.

But of course, as you might very well know, AdSense isn't just profitable for Google. It's also profitable for the people who advertise via AdWords and very profitable for publishers who use it to make earnings which are sometimes just enormous.

So one must ask himself why this is such a good deal for everybody. And the question in itself is very justified because you hardly ever come across something that's profitable for everyone in the chain. So why would AdSense be any different.

Well, AdSense is where it stands today, giving benefits for everybody in the game because it exploits a gap in the Internet's advertising model.

You see, the Internet is a very interactive environment, and its interactions come from the people who are browsing. They choose whether or not to follow a certain link and the term "navigating" is probably the most precise one at describing this situation.

So AdSense is great because it links together buyers and sellers. Yes, you have to hand it out to Google for a brilliant idea. They know there are people out there that want to buy stuff and people who want to sell them what they're interested in. And Google AdSense helps members of the two categories find each other.

It works for the visitors, because the model is very transparent. You don't see a huge graphic banner which tries to lure you into buying something. You just see a few words. And if you like what you see you can just click it. It works because visitors don't have that feeling of someone trying to lure them into spending money. Ironically, however, they're wrong.

It works for the AdWords advertisers because their ads go everywhere. Not only will they find themselves listed in Google's search which gets gazillions of hits per day, up front without working as much for SEO and waiting so much.

Their ads can reach any website that deals with anything similar to what they're trying to sell. Now you must realize they could never pull of such great advertising by themselves. And that brings us to the thing that makes Google's AdSense a publisher's best friend.

It comes from the fact that the ads are contextual, that they somehow related to the keywords you deal with on your page. Because people or on your site, which deals with a certain topic, you already know they're interested in that topic.

But, hey, wait a minute, Google knows some companies which want to sell your visitors something related to their topic. Google wants your visitors, you want Google's advertisers and the visitors just want to buy stuff. And that is the essence of what makes AdSense a great deal for everybody.

This is by far the most profitable hook-up deal you're ever going to see anywhere on the Internet.

So you have to appreciate Google for realizing a killer deal. You have to appreciate how well thought out, yet simple this scheme really is. Sure, in practice it has a few quirks but those are minor and, up to this point everyone seems to be enjoying Google's AdSense.


Tuesday 10 February 2009

How much money can I earn with Google Adsense?

That is a question that you might be asking soon after you sign up for the Google Adsense program. So often people are disappointed that they are only making around $1/day several months after signing up and creating their own website.


Yet you've probably heard of people who earn good money from Adsense, for example, John Reese earned over £500,000 in the past year and Michael Cheney regularly makes over $19000 per month (and that's not including affiliate sales!). You may not wish to be in the big league with them, but it certainly gives you the idea that there's big money to be made if you just know what to do.


Basically, if you're not hitting at least $1/day after six months, you urgently need to take some advice about getting more traffic to your site and also your use and placement of Google Ads.


I think that it's important to remember that it takes time to build up your income, but that it does gradually build as the search engines find your site, as you build more pages and as you build more links to your site.


The key to Adsense is to create content - you can do this by creating more pages or by creating more sites. For example, if you have one site that is earning just $1/day, that's $30/month. Ten sites like that will give you an income of $300/month, fifty sites will give you an income of $1500/month and so on. You get the idea!
Obviously you'll want to set up, build and test one website to start off with and then add other sites later on.


However, do be very careful if you are considering buying an Adsense Ready website - some of these may contain duplicate content which the search engines can spot a mile away. You could end up with plenty of content that you've paid good money for but very few visitors. Creating your own content is the key - either by writing it yourself , by using free articles from Article Directories such as Ezine Articles and then adding your own introduction to make them unique or you can even pay someone to create content for you via Elance. If you haven't got the time or patience to set up your own website, then you can buy existing websites for sale at places like Sedo and simply add your Adsense code to them.


Once you've started to build up an income, then you can start to experiment with placing and colour of your ads. If you can improve your click through rate (CTR) on your ads, then you can make more money from the same level of traffic. This is somewhere it can really pay to listen to the experts, just one eBook that I downloaded more than tripled the income from my own sites. Also, read up as much free information as you can, sign up for courses from the experts and try out new ideas. If you can get your CTR into double figures you'll be doing OK, although rumour has it that some of the experts have much higher click through's than that. Because it's against Googles terms and conditions to share this information, comparative figures are not readily available, however, by testing out ideas on your own site you'll be able to find out what works for you and your sites.




To get a free email mini-course on how to make the most money from your site, visit Make More Money from my Website.

This article was submitted by Jennifer Carter. Always take advice from the Google Adsense experts.

Catalogue: Internet Business | Ppc Advertising
Title: How much money can I earn with Google Adsense? By: Jennifer Carter

Saturday 7 February 2009

15 Common Mistakes by Google Adsense Publishers that Violate Terms of Service

Google Adsense program is a popular web advertising program which provides a good income source for many websites. There are well defined terms of service to strictly adhere to when participating in the program.

On my visit through sites and forums, I daily notice several instances of misuse of Adsense ads. Believe me, if I can see it in a 5 seconds gaze! - so can the Adsense guys. And if they do, you are on your way off the program. So here a few helpful Google Adsense tips, probably many you already know, and few you might gain by knowing now. These adsense faq are all picked from the Program Policies, Terms and Conditions and FAQ itself and presented in a simplified manner.

1. Never click your own adsense ads or get them clicked for whatever reason.
You know this one very well. This is a surefire way to close you Adsense account. Never tell your office associates or friends to click on them. Keep a check if your family or children are busy increasing your income by clicking your ads and indirectly trying to stop your income. Dont even think of offering incentives for clicks, using automated clicking tools, or other deceptive software. Adsense is very smart to detect fraudulent clicks. Check the ads which appear on your pages by the Google Preview tool if required.

2. Never change the Adsense code
There are enough means of adsense optimization & customizations available to change the colour, background or border to suit your needs. Do whatever you want to do outside the code, never fiddle within the ad or the search code. They know it when you do. The search code has more limitations to colour and placement, but you should adhere to the rules. The code may stop working and violates the TOS.

3. Do not place more than 3 ad unit and 1 ad links or 2 adsense search boxes on any web page. Anyway, ads will not appear in those units even if you place more ad units. But this is the limit they set, so it is better to stick to it.

4. Do not run competitive contextual text ad or search services on the same site which offer Google Adsense competition in their field. Never try to create link structures resembling the adsense ads. Never use other competitive search tools on the same pages which have Adsense powered Google search. They do allow affiliate or limited-text links.

5. Do not disclose confidential information about your account like the CTR, CPM and income derived via individual ad units or any other confidential information they may reveal to you. However, you may reveal the total money you make as per recent updates to the TOS.

6. Label headings as sponsored links or advertisements only. Other labels are not allowed. I have seen many sites label ads with other titles. Dont make your site a target in a few seconds gaze.

7. Never launch a New Page for clicked ads by default. Adsense ads should open on the same page. You may be using a base target tag to open all links in a new window or frame by default. Correct it now as they do not want new pages opening from clicked ads.

8. One Account suffices for Multiple websites.
You do not need to create 5 accounts for 5 different websites. One account will do. If you live in the fear that if one account is closed down for violation of TOS, believe me they will close all accounts when they find out. You can keep track of clicks by using channels with real time statistics. They will automatically detect the new site and display relevant ads.

9. Place ads only on Content Pages.
Advertisers pay only for content based ads. Content drives relevant ads. Although you might manage some clicks from error, login, registration, thank you or welcome pages, parking pages or pop ups, it will get you out of the program.

10. Do not mask ad elements.
Alteration of colours and border is a facility to blend or contrast ads as per your site requirements. I have seen many sites where the url part is of the same colour as the background. While blending the ad with your site is a good idea, hiding relevant components of the ads is not allowed. Also do not block the visibility of ads by overlapping images, pop ups, tables etc.

11. Do not send your ads by email.
Html formatted emails look good and allow placement of these JavaScript ads. But it is not allowed as per TOS. You do not want impressions registering on their logs from any email even once. They are watching!

12. Keep track of your content.
So Adsense is not allowed on several non content pages. But it is also not allowed on several content pages too. Do not add it on web pages with MP3, Video, News Groups, and Image Results. Also exclude any pornographic, hate-related, violent, or illegal content.

13. Do not alter the results after ad clicks or searches - Ensure you are not in any way altering the site which the user reaches to after clicking the ads. Do not frame, minimize, remove, redirect or otherwise inhibit the full and complete display of any Advertiser Page or Search Results Page after the user clicks on any Ad or Search results.

14. Avoid excessive advertising and keyword stuffing - Although the definition of 'excessive' is a gray area and is subject to discretion, yet Google adsense with correct placement, focused content and high traffic will get you much more income than other programs, so excessive advertising is not required. Keyword stuffing does target better focused ads, but overdoing it is not required.

15. Ensure you Language is Supported - Adsense supports Chinese (simplified), Japanese, Danish, Korean, Dutch, Norwegian, English, Polish, Finnish, Portuguese, French, Russian, German, Spanish, Hungarian, Swedish, Italian and Turkish. In addition, AdSense for search is available in Czech, Slovak, and Traditional Chinese. If your web pages language is not supported, do not use the code on such pages.





Saturday 24 January 2009

Understanding the Google Adsense Report

When you log into your Google Adsense account, you are automatically taken to the page where you can view all your Adsense activity. On the Reports tab, you'll see "Today's Earnings." This is the approximate amount you have earned today in your Google Adsense account. Earnings are not final at this point and could be adjusted for invalid clicks or fees.

It's interesting to look at the breakdown. As you can see, Adsense for Content, which refers to the targeted ads appearing on the pages in which you have written content, is listed first. Here you will see the number of page impressions listed in the first column. While a page impression is generally the same as a page view, that is not always the case. For a more detailed definition of a page impression, see Google Adsense support, click on Your Adsense Account and then click on Your Adsense Report.

Next, you'll notice the number of clicks. This refers to the number of times "your ads" were clicked on.

Page click through rate or CTR is in the next column shown as a percentage. It represents the percentage of the time an ad was clicked on after viewing your page.

Page CPM which stands for effective cost per thousand impressions. It is calculated by dividing total earnings by the number of page impressions in thousands.

Don't be intimidated by these statistics. The bottom line, your earnings, is what really counts. As you become more familiar with Google Adsense, statistics will become like second nature. First, just start.

How is Google Adsense Different From Other Ad Networks?

Primarily because it is Google and that carries a lot of clout just with name recognition alone. But here are some advantages to being a part of the Google Adsense network:

Getting started is fast and easy and requires no technical knowledge. Google Adsense even provides html code for easy implementation with clear instructions.

Google Adsense has both the Adsense for Content feature and the Adsense for Search feature.

Google Adsense not only provides keyword targeted ads but site targeted ads as well, maximizing your potential for revenue.

Google Adsense provides a filter so that you can choose not to run your competitor's ads on your pages as well as filter other unwanted ads.

Google Adsense provides an extensive support site that is easily understood.



About the author:

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Tuesday 20 January 2009

Google Adsense Strategies and Tips

Adsense is beginning to make a huge impact on the affiliate marketing industry today. Because of this, weak affiliate merchants have the tendency to die faster than ever and ad networks will be losing their customers quickly.

If you are in a losing rather than winning in the affiliate program you are currently promoting, maybe it is about time to consider going into the Adsense marketing and start earning some real cash.

Google is readily providing well written and highly relevant ads that are closely chosen to match the content on your pages. You do not have to look for them yourselves as the search engine will be the doing the searching for you from other people's source.

You also don't have to spend time in choosing different kind of ads for different pages. Google makes it very easy for you, with no codes to mess around for different affiliate programs.

You will be able to concentrate on providing good and quality content, as the search engines will be the ones finding the best ads in which to put your pages on.

You are still allowed to add Adsense ads even if you already have affiliate links on your site. It is prohibited, however, to imitate the look and feel of the Google ads for your affiliate links. One of the things you can do, however, is to utilize Google's custom palette to customize your Google ads, making them to appear a part of the web page itself. The idea here is to match background and links to match the theme of your site. People on the internet today are trained to click on a link that is blue, and if your Google ads have the same theme as your web page, it makes the Google ads appear to be a portion of your "content."

You can also filter up to 200 URLs. This gives you a chance to block ads for the sites that do not meet your guidelines, and also block competitors. Remember that it is unavoidable that Adsense may be competing for some space on web sites that all other revenues are sharing.

Owners of small sites are allowed to plug a bit of a code into their sites and instantly have relevant text ads that appeal to your visitors appear instantly on your pages. If you own many sites, you only need to apply once. Then ,you are issued a unique "publisher ID", which can be used on any site you currently own. A small snippet of Javascript is placed on your site in the location you wish the ads to appear in, and generally speaking, the ads from Goggle will appear in minutes. This ends the hassle of having to apply to many affiliate programs, and keeping track of many different URL's and user ID's and passwords.

As Google ads are very easy to customize, and can be placed anywhere on your site you wish, you can experiment with placement, colors, and themes. Many tricks are available to the resourceful webmaster, including adding images in conjunction with your Google ads to make them more noticeable.

The payment rates can vary extremely. The payment you will be receiving per click depends on how much advertisers are paying per click to advertise with the use of the AdWords. Advertisers can pay as little as 5 cents and as high as $10-12, sometimes even more than that too. Some savvy lawyers are currently paying as high as $75 for advertising the keyword mesothelioma! And you, as the ad publisher, are earning a share of that money generated.

If your results remain stagnant, it can help if you try and build simple and uncluttered pages so that the ads can catch the visitor's eyes more. It sometimes pay to differ from the usual things that people are doing already. Google has many tutorials, including a "heat chart" which shows you where the best placement for ads are. You will need an account to access these tutorials. Sign up for an Adsense account at https://www.google.com/adsense/?sourceid=aso&subid=ww-et-awhome&hl=en_US. It is also a refreshing sight for your visitor once they see something different for a change.

It is still wise to look at other people's information and format your Adsense in a like manner. A wise old business axiom is to "find a good business model, then copy it." Let others do the hard work for you, and learn from a successful site. Just think about it as doing yourself a favor by not having to work too hard to know what content to have. Look to sites that have high page rank, and carefully observe their layouts, their content, and placement of their ads. A little time spent doing research can put dollars in your pocket down the road.

Publishers have the option of choosing to have their ads displayed only on a certain site or sites. You can also have them displayed on a large network of sites if you so desire. Google now has the option to allow other people to advertise on your site. This only makes good sense. If you are marketing to a tightly defined niche, you can place your own ads, written by you, on site that allow this option. The choice is yours, depending on what you think will work best to your advantage.

It is important to note that you cannot choose certain topics only. If you do this, search engines will not place Adsense ads on your site and you will be missing out a great opportunity in making hundreds and even thousands of dollars cash.

Topics to be avoided includes gambling, firearms, ammunition, tobacco or drugs. If you are being offered more cash in exchange of doing Adsense with these kinds, it is just like signing your own termination paper.

With all the information that people need in your hands already, all you have to do is turn Google Adsense into your own cash cow. It all boils down to a win-win situation both for the content site owners and the webmasters or publishers.

Our website, http://www.for-the-record.biz, is a good source of information for the beginning marketer. We present a lot of content for those needing more information on a variety of subjects.



About The Author:

Alden Smith is an award winning author who has been marketing on the internet for over 7 years. His site, http://www.for-the-record.biz, is loaded with articles and information for the beginning blogger and internet marketer.

Alden Smith is a published author, and has been marketing on the internet for 7 years. Read more articles at his website, King Discus, an active gathering place for discus breeders and lovers of discus fish. His wife Betsy is the administrator of All The Best Recipes a site rich in online recipes and cookbooks.


Wednesday 14 January 2009

Advice On How To Increase Your Google Adsense Earnings

In this article I give advice about ways in which you can increase the amount you earn from Google adsense. I run adsense on a number of my sites and it is proving to be a very good form of second income. Many other people are now putting the code onto their own sites which can help them to pay for hosting and domain renewal costs.

Should you run adsense on your website?

In my opinion there are many positive reasons to have these google ads on your website but there are also reasons why you may not want them on there. On the positive side you are of course likely to earn money when people click on one of the ads, this can be a useful income, however unless you have either a high traffic site or a large number of sites, you are unlikely to get rich from it.

On the negative side when people click on one of the ads it is actually taking away that visitor from your site. If you are offering a service it therefore probably is not worth signing up for adsense for that site. If the site is purely for information purposes I would say that it is worth adding the code.

How to increase your adsense earnings

There are many ways in which you can blend the adverts into your website by choosing a particular colour for the ads as an example. Placement of the ads is also quite important and there is information on the Google site which advises where to put the adverts for maximum impact.

I believe the best way to increase your earnings however is to get more traffic to the website. There are many ways of doing this:

Google adwords

You can create an advertising campaign using google adwords. You could opt to pay near enough the minimum fee per click and this will keep the costs down. People will then visit your site and hopefully click on one of the other ads, therefore making you money.

This can work very well for certain subjects, but not so well for others. It is a matter of trial and error, I always run the adwords for around a month and then evaluate if it is worth carrying on after that point.

It is obviously important that we do not spend more on our own advertising, than we are likely to earn.

Purchase a text link ad

This is becoming more and more popular as one way backward links are becoming ever more powerful in the eyes of the search engines. These type of links are however quite hard to come by.

By purchasing a text link advert you are likely to have an increase in web traffic from two avenues. Firstly from the advert itself and also from the page rank value of the backward link.

At articles-submission.com you are able to purchase nine of these permanent backward links for only £50, which includes a link on a page rank five page.

Writing articles

Writing articles can also help you to obtain more visitors to your site. The people who read the article are potential visitors, you also obtain a one way backward link from the article directory which you submit the article to, and other webmasters may also include the article on their own site, thus creating another one way backward link. These backward links help to increase your overall page rank. The higher the page rank, the more traffic you should receive.

Link exchange

Exchanging links with other websites which are hopefully in the same business sector as your own, also has value. These links are not as powerful as the one way links mentioned above but are still worth seeking.

You can e-mail or phone other webmasters to ask if they would be happy to swap links with your site.

Build a site network

If you have the time and available funds you could also consider building a network of sites, all on the same theme. Each of the sites in the network would have a link pointing to the main site. They could also have adsense on the sites thus increasing your earnings in a two-fold manner.

I hope this article helps you in your quest to increase your adsense earnings.



Stephen Hill helps to promote a number of websites including:

stuttering

cheap ringtones

aviation cleaning products

Stephen Hill runs The How To Stop Stammering Centre to help people who stutter to achieve fluency