Rounded corners on adsense ads, when did that become a feature?

[livingingermany]

Whilst regenerating an adcode, I noticed the feature:

"Corner Styles
Optionally, choose from one of our pre-designed corner styles"

And there are several choices that dramatically improve the look of an ad when a background colour the same as the border colour is used.

When did this get added? i never noticed it before. Anyone had more success after enabling this feature?

I must admit, it does look good.

[Computerized]

Cool, I didn't notice that until now. I like it a lot!

[sniperx]

you can make it yourself.
blend ads above rounded corners pe-designed box.

[qwestcommunications]

It does look nice.

[keela]

I did notice today, and I must say it's pretty cool and interesting.

[-Maverick-]

I'm always happy to see new options for the look and feel of the ads. I'll definately be using this one.

[cesspit]

I just realised it too. With rounded corners isn't it the same with adsense background which have rounded backgrounds too? So that means backgrounds are OK in adsense?

[AngelaR]

I like them alot, I just integrated it into my site.

[livingingermany]

Just received an email posting from the Adsense team, the full details can be found at http://adsense.blogspot.com/2007/06/...and-round.html

[agnivo007]

Yea, just saw this today...a good option for people who want to match their curved border themes Plus looks different than default ads...I hope it increases CTR

[tacosalad]

My ad background is the same color as the page background, so the rounded corners don't show up.

But, I'm going to use them anyway because I can! Even though no one can see them

[Blackmane]

I think they implemented that today got a newsletter e-mail about it.

[pozer]

This is really cool, I'm going to test it's ctr performance right away

[Abhik]

I was just getting code for one of my blog.. It was not appeared for my account.
Probably they are testing it with a few publisher.

[john269]

Wow, I also didn't notice that you could do that. It seems that Google doesn't email you anymore when they add new features to Adsense. Well I have not got an email from them in a while anyway.

[livingingermany]

I did a quick test with this new feature on one of my sites yesterday, where the background is normally a type of blue background colour, I added the bgcolor of adsense as white and the border as blue, with very rounded corners. The ad looked nicely shaped bu the results were staggering. Normally that ad position would get at least 15 clicks per evening and after the change was made, no clicks whatsoever. Then reverted back to normal placement without colour changes or rounded corners and all is fine again. So, my somewhat basic experiment proved to me that in a small sample, on one website, the new feature does not convert at all.

[Rasputin]

Thanks for posting those results.

I am doing a similar experiment - the pages in the section being tested look great, but my early indications are also that no one is clicking.

Stats will be more clear later on perhaps.

[john269]

It's rather odd as it's new. I would have thought it would increase the clicks for the first few months until people start getting use to it.

[livingingermany]

Yeah but in my case it stuck out like a sore thumb, especially the ads by google thingy. I prefer to blend the ads into the site as they compliment the site, rather than contrast the content, which I admit in some cases draws necessary attention to the ad, hence providing the conversion.

I also only dabbled with only one format, which for me the best converting one is the half banner, possibly due to the fact that there is no URL in the half banner. On other sites, the large rectangle converts better as it looks like additional links related to the content. With the new fancy borders in action, the large rectangle no longer looks like a list of links relating to the content as it has a rounded box around the list, thus turning eyes away from the list and making it clear that it's an ad block. I have also not tried wrapping text around the large rectangle with or without rounded edges.

[dvirhazout]

wow!!
great new feature!!
thanks for letting us know