Adsense Help Needed Very Low CTR

Hi guys after viewing and researching other people results I have realized I have quite a large problem with my ctr and would love some help.





To give you some info about my site so that you guys can asses it, its a 4 month old football (soccer) blog, specifically about the arsenal team. It uses the Mandigo theme and its currently 2 columns but able to change it to three. It gets about 400 visitors per day from direct visitors and search engines & on match days 1000+ w/ promotion which brings in traffic from reffered sites.

You can see it @ arsenalhighlights(dot)com


I would really appreciate help from people with experience in monetizing blogs. Suggestions such as ad size/placement (screenshots if able), suggested affiliate programs & placement, different them or layout, and any other ways you can suggest.



Thank You in Advance,

Radico

 

Many factors can cause the CTR low.
1. Traffic - what is your traffic source? Get more SE traffic will helps on increasing CTR
2. Ads setting and placement - This is also another factor that affect the CTR
3. Content - Unique and intresting content helps on CTR too

 

square block is best, put it right below the title so its the 1st thing they see.

 

Sports can be a very tough niche. I had a mixed martial arts blog and barely got any clicks. And those clicks were worthless. I would look at adding affiliate marketing (books, DVD's, memorabilia, that sort of thing) and CPM advertising.

 

So far taking into account the advice I have put adsense beside the pictures in the content (3 articles per page) and Bwin links at the bottom of each post, at the very bottom, and in the sidebar.

After using crazy egg I have noticed that many of my visitors exit through my blogroll. Do you think it would be a good idea to take it off the sidebar and put google ads there instead?

 

I have several affiliates which promote our sports tickets on their blogs and do very well. This is by far much better than AdSense alone.

Football blogs can certainly generate a very respectable income.

 

You should place more ad units per post. You are allowed to place 3 units and place them in various places, like side bar, below the post. Experiment with diff positions.

 

That is true I have a page on the Clemson Tigers and it has the highest CTR on any of my sites. Using the team colors apparently has a big effect on visitors.

I am in the same boat as the original poster.

14,000+ visitors a day and CTR hovering around .08 to 1.0

 

Nice site.. However I couldn't see any ads until the middle section of the site.. I would recommend you place a leaderboard ad on the top of the website...

 

I'd say shrink your image size and put an adsense medium rectangle beside them. If you don't want to do that you can edit your single post template, so that a large adsense ad block appears directly under the post title.

Also, I noticed that the google ads are mostly showing dating ads like lavalife etc. That could be part of the low CTR problem.

 

Experiment on your ad placement. I suggest you put an image ad on the header. Based on my experience, that works a lot. I get many clicks from it.

 

Arsenal is my favourite Team in England I love it

I would do the following things if i were you.
First I had a Sport Blog before , it had the best click/views percent within my blogs and sites
So Sport Site should have alot of clicks , Except , if your 17000 views are done by 500-1000 vistors for example

Second thing , Dont use image ads , text ads are better

Third I dont like your ads places
In my opinion:
add a 728x90 ads in the bottom of the header with white background & border and red title , black url and description
below the "Home | ArsenalStore | TeamHistory ........" Buttons
and another 160X600 in the sidebar same colors
and third one below the post exactly (below the last word in your post , not below the post's box) and make it 468X60 same colors or only change title to black

Another suggestion , the header 728X90 ads maynot be added and add instead of it a 336X280 ad box above the post's content and under the post's title
the diffrence between 728X90's and 336X280's places and size is that , the 728 will have few clicks with high cost while 336 will have more clicks with lower cost so your choice

I amnot sure if that will work with your or not , but as i told you i will do that if i were you , beside you can try it for 3 days and dont forget to tell me if it works
Viva Arsenal....

 

That was my first post i wish it will be benifitable one

 

Well, your CTR depends hugely on your niche, so there is nothing you can possible try except placement targeting. Try to have more number of ad units one day and on the other day try just one or two ads. Change the placement regularly to find better results.

 

Thanks Guys! for all your help. I have dug down deep into my themes code and have placed ads as per your help. You can check it out now. Ill update you in a few days.

Again Ty