Will said: "Don't clutter your page with competing ads that don't pay. If a user clicks on an ad that pays you $.01, they are not clicking on an ad that pays you $.20." Later Will clarified and said he was talking about ads that were not adsense ads. However, this still has me wondering about a few things and hopefully you all can give me some insight. If I have a page with 3 different adsense code on it, do not some ads pay better than others? If so, is there a way to tell? By putting 3 different adsense codes/ads on a single page, does that lessen what the ads pay? Did I ask that well? Let me try again. If I have only one ad on a page, is the value of that ad greater by itself versus being on a page with more than one ad? Thanks
If you put say 3 large rectangles in a vertical stack one on top of another (and they are written into the source code like that as well) Google will typically see that as 12 ads spots it needs to fill, and in Google's ad serving algorithm it will look for the ads of relevance to your page and that are the highest earning and then they will be listed in descending order of earnings. So the ads at the top will most likely be worth more than the ones that appear at the bottom. That said because one advertiser might be paying 50 cents a click doesn't mean he will rank above the guy paying 30 cents a click - Google has a complicated algorithm that puts the highest EARNING ads at the top so if the 30 cent ads get click 3 times as much as the 50 cent ads Google will place them in a more prominent position. So if you are trying to work out if putting more ads on your page is a good idea, it might be of interest to consider what range of payments you are dealing with. For example if you top ads are playing $2 but there isn't a lot of competition in the niche and ads after the first 5 advertisers don't even pay 10 cents a click then you might consider only putting one, maybe two ad units on your page because having more ads just gives your visitors the opportunity to click the lower paying ads.
Well written but some of the points are a little outdated i think, like using lots of ads, fewer the better imo. The more blocks used the more low paying ads displayed and more chance of getting low cpcs.
Nice Thread, unfortunately there are new rules from Google now. Ad blending is strictly forbidden, and will get you banned. You'd better update the tips which you have given.
AdSense blending is not forbidden, there are just rules to be followed. The most important thing to keep in mind when using multiple AdSense blocks is to make absolutely certain that the ad block with the highest CTR appears first in your HTML source.
Nice tips. But most are general tips. My advice is optimize your adsense according to your site. General tips may not suitable to your site like use blue links, place ads on the left.
Thanks for the great info and tips Will, how do you know which ad block has the highest CTR? Isn't what the ad pays per click a google secret or am I missing something? Sorry if my question may be naive. I'm still a rookie at this. If I understand. it sounds as if it is better to put only one or two ads on a page versus 3, plus the search box, plus the ad links. The more adsense stuff you put on a page, the less value the ads are. Thanks Steve
Use Custom Channels. CTR is Click Through Ratio. You will get this data in your AdSense reports. A lot of people say that, but I have run extensive tests which tell the completely opposite story. I believe that what those people are doing wrong is involved with placement. If you put your third ad block (as seen from the source code viewpoint) in the most prominent display location, you will lose money from running three ad blocks. If you put your third ad block (as seen from the source code viewpoint) in the least prominent ad space, you will gain incremental revenue.
Nice Post . Extreme Blending is not good though .. About Putting ads in the left , i thought it was at the right since most People are right handed.
Will your patience and practical experience is something we all should strive for. The fact I have a hard time grasping your concept just means I’m letting my reading (on google site) get in the way of understanding. With that said, I want to thank you and I will leave this with what little logic I can grasp from this subject. If I have 3 ads on a page (for simplicity purposes I have a top ad, middle ad and bottom ad) if the middle ad is getting great CTR, moving it to the top makes no sense. Logic may say that the top ad, by position, should get the most CTRs, but if on a particular page it happens to be the middle ad, it is position I need to concentrate on, not the ad itself. As far as I know, there is no way of knowing what a click is going to pay before hand. If that was the case and my highest CTR happen to be the middle position, and my highest paid ads happen to be the top ad, I would move the top ad to the middle. Yet, some threads suggest that if I move the ad to the middle, the value of that ad will drop. So I'm thinking, find the best position on a page that your ads get the most CTRs. Once you find that, to ensure that you have the highest paid ads, put all other ads below that position. For example, if I find on a paticular page that the middle of the page gets the best CTR, remove any ads above it. All other ads would go below the middle position. I hope my logic doesn't mess me up. I'm about to start reworking my whole site. Trying to grasp this concept was the only thing holding me up. Thanks again for your thoughts and help. Steve
There is no way of knowing what a click is going to pay beforehand, but what you do know is that Google sorts the ads by CPM and places the best paying ads first. People get tripped up before "first" in the source code can be "last" on the displayed page. That's the joy of CSS layout. So, in your example, you can still have an ad that displays "above" your highest CTR ad spot -- but it should be "below" your highest CTR ad spot in your HTML source code.