Question is in the title. I've noticed some of the sites ranking above me have fewer backlinks and fewer pages indexed but are still ranking higher. I know there are a lot of factors that contribute to this but is having adsense on your site a big one?
It won't boost SERPS. SEO is the one that matters, others like domain name matters too. E.g. coolstuffs.com will have advantage in serps over stuffz.com for keyword "cool stuffs"
Its not by the number of backlinks, its by their quality. I could have a 1000 posts here in the forum, each with a link to my website in the signature, and a competitor with a few quality .edu could beat me in the SERPs
I highly doubt it and have no reason to believe it would. SERP is based on a google algorithm and I don't think they would give you any incentive like that to add adsense to ur site.
Unfortunately adsense, in my experience does not appear to boost serps. Backlink placement using high PR sites over 6, such as .gov and edu. sites are your best bet combined with social bookmarking and article spinning. The best plan for adsense is to try and get one that pays out with a high CPC, and make it the same as your main keyword you are trying to rank for. Use the google adwords tool to hep you out here.
nobody here knows this for a fact!! UNLESS they work for google. I have noticed that sites i use a lot of adsense on rank faster and higher then site which have no adsense. also consider this "not disagreeing with anyone, but got this for a good source": If google de rank a proven adsense earner "$1k a month" for an non adsense site "$0 per month" Google would be in effect throwing away money. Now I like i said, No one here know for a fact, but i have heard "past adsense, and analytic data play a role in SERP" I have also heard competitor networks and affiliate ads over adsense can negatively hurt your ranking. something to keep in mind.