Well, now that Google has put the kibosh on images near adsense ads, does anyone know of any other tricks that are in compliance with their TOS, that work well? The only thing I can think of is placing in the hot spots and blending the text...but that doesn't work nearly as well as the image trick. Google certainly makes it challenging!
True, but good content alone won't work - but does help maximize your traffic. Once you have excellent content and traffic - what could be done to maximize your clicks?
Read my topic here - http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=209681 What I have done is use bright, rotating colour palettes to attract attention rather than images. It isn't as successful as images at increasing CTR but it has improved my CPC by a lot.
I think Google's recent stance on the images/ad thing makes one thing crystal clear - you are going to have to make SUPER targeted niche blogs to get clicks that match the image/ad trick. I'm starting a blog on Toe Jam right now.
I think you might want to rephrase things a little. The word "trick" implied you are doing something deceitful, which is exactly why Google banned images in the first place. Don't try and do anything that could mislead the visitors on your site and cause them to accidentally click on them. Concentrate on placing you ads where people will notice them, read them and respond to them.