5 Simple Tips To Increase Adsense Income
By Bryan Clark on Aug 2, 2007 in Uncategorized
Adsense is probably the most popular PPC (Pay-Per-Click) advertising available to blogs. More blogs use Adsense than proper punctuation!
I read a lot of other blogs, forums, and articles about bloggers that simply hate Adsense. Why? BECAUSE THEY DON’T KNOW HOW TO USE IT EFFECTIVELY! They trash Adsense because of their lack of success (lack of research would be a better phrase)… even though it generates TENS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS monthly to those that know how to use it correctly.
Adsense 101 is out the door. Let’s really learn how to make some money with Adsense!
1. Learn to blend your ads.
- Learn to use colors effectively. The idea is to make the ads appear to be a natural part of your site. Don’t be the guy/girl that uses the lime green text on an orange background because he thinks that it “catches the eye”. It Does! It catches the eye long enough to feel nausea coming on.
- Never use the “border” option! If you use a border, are you really blending your ads? It’s kind of like building a prison for your ads using a 2px line as bars. Using a banner just screams “Here are my ads. Don’t look at them!”
- Don’t ever segregate ads. Don’t put them in their own section of the page. Don’t have 9 affiliate buttons followed by an Adsense banner. How effective is it for advertising if you throw all of your ads in one section of your sidebar? Why have them at all? This advertising strategy (or lack thereof) causes what’s referred to as “link-blindness”. If people can easily spot your ads as soon as they find your site, they learn to avoid them. And never… ever… put them all by themselves at the bottom of the page. FACT: Most readers never make it to the bottom of your page!
2. Put your ads in high profile areas.
- Use the Google “heatmap” (pictured below) to help you determine where the best spots are to place Adsense code. The best area is right above content. The orange areas are hot zones, the yellow is mild, and the white is ice cold. This will vary blog-by-blog but it’s a good general indication of what works.
- I see a lot, and I mean A LOT of sites thinking they can hide their ads in the bottom left corner of the page and still make good money from Adsense. When it comes to ads, either do it… or don’t. Don’t go hiding ads in the bottom corner and then complaining that Adsense sucks and you aren’t making any money.
3. Track your ads performance.
- A lot of people either forget about this one, or don’t realize it exists. You can track your ads performance by creating a channel for it. If you need a tutorial on how to create an Adsense channel, check out this video at Tubetorial.Com for more info.
- I have channels for every different location, style, and color type ad that I have experimented with. For example, I can check right now and see what is more effective, a 160×600 sidebar banner, or a 125×125 button. You need to know this stuff!
4. Use the competitive ad filter.
- Did you know that some Adsense clicks are worth as little as $0.01? Use the competitive ad filter to stop this!
- The competitive ad filter was created to target spam advertisers and MFA (made for adsense) sites. You have all seen this, I guarantee it. They are the sites that you visit on accident when looking for another site. They might look like a search engine with some ads all around about a specific subject such as baseball, blogging, vacationing, jobs, etc. These are all MFA sites. They bid low and get clicks to their site for as little as a penny!
- By using the filter, you can block these sites from advertising on your blog. In your Adsense control pannel simply click on the “Competitive Ad Filter” tab and enter the URL you wish to block. It’s that easy. Most of the time you’ll be able to tell it’s a MFA site by the content in the ad. If it seems like a list of some sort, more often than not, it’s an MFA site.
5. Use section targeting.
- This is one that I didn’t even know existed until a few days ago. Adsense targets keywords in your text and matches them with an ad. For example, you may notice if you blog about golf, you’ll have golf related ads. The key to getting targeted ads on Adsense is writing keyword rich content. This means that you need to think of a word or phrase you would use if you were searching for this article on Google. Try to use that keyword or phrase as much as possible, without becoming too repetitive and Google will pick that up and match it to relevant ads.
- You can also use this bit of code on posts in which you only want to target a certain part of. For example, you are talking about golf… but there is a quick story about your car having a flat on the way to the golf course. Without using this code, Google might target your site with golf related ads, or it might decide that you need ads about getting new tires. You can stop this by using these section targeting ads.
Talk about your flat tire here…
<!– google_ad_section_start –>
Put your keyword rich content here.
<!– google_ad_section_end –>
- Using <!–google_ad_section_start–> at the beginning of the section you want to target and <!–google_ad_section_end–> at the end of the targeted section will ensure that Google delivers relevant ads to your site. If you are using Wordpress software, simply type out your entry - click on the “code” tab - and add these tags to the section you want to target. Easy!
Above all else I recommend experimenting. What works for other site might not necessarily work for yours. Try different ad sizes, shapes, and colors. Put them in your post, above your post, in the sidebar. Just try new things until you find what works for you. But remember… track your experiments so that you’ll know what works!
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44 Comment(s)
By lordmanilastone on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Thanks for sharing though I find some parts of it complicated. I wish I could try that soon when I have the time. Thanks again for the thought.^^
By GoalGuru.com on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
The new changes are awesome Bryan. I can tell how much you’re investing in your craft. It really shows in every post and every modification you make. Kudos. You’re well on your way!
-Jill
By Bryan on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
lordmanilastone - Email me and I’ll explain whatever you don’t understand!
Jill - Thanks… Now if I could only find time to sleep!
By Average Joe Blogger on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Good pointers, Bryan.
By Opal Tribble on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
These are good points and as you mentioned I think it varies depending on the blog.
The left hand side bar didn’t do well for me, but the top right hand side bar gets the most clicks. I experimented with various placements before I set my adblock on the right hand side bar.
I have another website where the top banner gets the most clicks. It’s important to really be attentive what your ad blocks are doing and don’t be afraid to experiment with the placement it it isn’t working. Keeping the ads above the fold have been the winners on my website.
I use section targetting on all my website I also tell them which sections to ignore. On my main site I turn it off in my comments since it tends to get off topic.
Text that AdSense should ignore
By lady influence on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
very very nicely put! and you have a well organized, very professional looking website.
By Sutocu on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Very good tips. I too hate it when I see a site with poorly blended ads that just jump at you.
The competitive filter in AdSense seems to take a lot of work though… You need to enter every single site you want to block?
By Janet on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Great tips Bryan. I already do most of them, but the “competitive ad filter” was news to me. Also…. “more blogs use Adsense than proper punctuation!” LOVED THAT!
By Janet on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
OH - and I love your new header. The chubby little naked guys are very cute!
By Sly from Slyvisions.com on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
I’m not a user of AdSense, but those sure are good points. I can still incorporate them for other ad services.
Sly from Slyvisions.com
By GoneFishing on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Nice write up…
By internetgenius on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Excellent advice for using AdSense … keep up the good work! Your site is incredible, informative, and most-of-all, practical. That is why I am a subscriber! Nobody (even “The Internet Genius”) knows everything, and there will always be something to learn, something that can be improved upon. I’m glad I can be a part of your learning process, and even learn something for myself along the way!
By Missy on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Brian:
I do have adsense on my main blog, Groovy Vegetarian, but am not expecting a boatload of cash as my blog is new and not yet heavily visited. Although for a blog that is less than a month old, my traffic is doing pretty good. From my understanding with Adsense, one has to receive like (10,000 or more visitors) for their to be any kind of decent return. Am i wrong about this?
I believe more in affiliate marketing and other monetization methods, before Adsense. Most of the big time bloggers on the web who show their income, always show adsense as their lowest money maker. More money can be made on private ad arrangements, paid reviews, text links, affiliate ads, and sponshorship.
If anything of the tips you provided, the one i need to implement is (better placement) of the Adsense Ads.
Thanxs for the tips.
Missy.
By icedragon on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
made us think about the way that adsense is in our site
By Terence Chang on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
I will add my 2 cents here, so I don’t have to write up an entire post.
1. Don’t ever try to click on your own ads. You will get banned. Google knows who, where, when and what viewer clicks on the ad.
2. Get Google Analytic installed. The best way to know if you are placing your Adsense correctly is to use Analytic’s Content->Oviewer->Site Overlay features. You will see which area have most clicks. You will implement your ads there.
Great job! Bryan!
By Bryan on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Missy - That’s mostly correct. To see a SIZEABLE income from Adsense you need a lot of visitors. However, you can use these tips to maximize your earnings even with only a few readers.
Thanks for the comments everyone!
By Jason on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Very well-put together post about increasing AdSense earnings. I particularly think #s 1 and 2 have had a huge impact on me.
It took me a long time to discover the Heat Map, so I’m sure there are tons of other readers who will find that helpful, like I did.
I commented back to you at my blog about your banner. It’s still remains up at all 1,925 pages of wn.goldenprose.com.
Bryan, remember I was telling you about the ProBlogger writing project the other day? http://www.problogger.net/archives/2007/08/02/learn-how-to-blog-better-reader-blog-tips/
Check it out dog.
There’s still time to get one of your posts featured in it. I got around 40 hits today from my link. Pretty sweet. Not to mention a boost in PR. Plus, it’s nice to get a little recognition from a site that every blogger and their mom reads.
By Jason on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
By the way, cool new layout.
By Missy on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Wonderful tip, Terence, i did not know that about Google Analytics. I’m off to install it on my “Groovy Veg” blog. I hope i can figure it out, last time, i was on GA, it seemed Chinese to me, it can be a bit complicated and involved. Let’s see if i can pull it off. lol. Good tip!
Missy.
By Sly from Slyvisions.com on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Speaking of heat maps, Jason, check out my article on Crazy Egg. It’s a great online service makes a very cool heat map based on the amount of visits you set it.
http://slyvisions.com/files/track-visitors-actions-with-crazy-egg.html
Sly from Slyvisions.com
By B. Durant on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Tip 5 is great about sectional targeting. Wasn’t aware of that. Since most writers try to get a summary in the first paragraph that seems a good place to target and make rich with the appropriate keywords.
By Bryan on Aug 2, 2007 | Reply
Durant - This is true!
By Milan on Aug 3, 2007 | Reply
Good, great text.
Only thing about filtering some websites (ADs) is… how do you know which one of these ADs bringing you $0.01 ? ? ?
If you click - that’s bad… in case of link unit of course, otherwise for normal ADs we can see the URl, but still, how can we be sure how much money does it bring to us?
By Bryan on Aug 3, 2007 | Reply
Milan - It’s an educated guess really. You check your adsense revenue in the administrator panel of your adsense account. Divide the total amount, by the number of clicks… this gives you an amount that you are averaging per click. If it is low, simply remove the advertiser that you think is paying the low amount. It’s trial and error really. But it definitely saves you some cash!
By cooliojones on Aug 4, 2007 | Reply
I just got started with #3 a few weeks ago, because before I couldn’t figure it out for some reason. It’s good, especially when you have multiple sites. Good solid post.
By Bryan on Aug 4, 2007 | Reply
coolio - I’ve only been blogging a few weeks… so I’m in the same boat. It has helped me a ton since I’ve implemented it though.
By RT Cunningham on Aug 4, 2007 | Reply
Can you share the URLs you have in your competitive ad filter with me via email, Bryan? I’m in the Philippines and I don’t see the ads that the majority of my readers see — so putting the ones I see in there is ineffective.
By Bryan on Aug 4, 2007 | Reply
RT - I just found out about the competitive ad filter myself. As soon as I find some low paying sites I’ll share it with you!
By A.J. - IAmFacingMillions.com on Aug 4, 2007 | Reply
Sharing the low paying ads from one site to the next isn’t likely to be all that helpful (at least I don’t think). There are many of them and endless variants. What is appearing on Bryan’s unique set of keywords/posts/articles is not likely to be the same as what is on yours.
By Bryan on Aug 4, 2007 | Reply
Very true Aj!
Did anyone notice that this article was linked to on ProBlogger??
By The Happy Rock on Aug 4, 2007 | Reply
Thanks for the few tips, I am testing my site with adsense and I am trying to figure it out. Not much luck so far. Only three clicks in a few weeks.
I would love to see your numbers or others, people are kind of tight lipped about earnings or even clicks. It would help people see if you are really doing poorly or well.
By Matt Wolfe on Aug 7, 2007 | Reply
I like your site a lot. Great post on generating adsense revenue. I will definantly use it on my site. We have a very a similar goal btw.
By Dee on Aug 9, 2007 | Reply
Nice post. Very helpful.
By Columbus SEO on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply
Hey,
I liked this, although I couldn’t find any adsense on this site!
Anywho, I’ve also heard of a few great services that will give you lists of advertisers who are notorious for low click prices (like 1 cent) that you can ban from your site.
Apparently it helps!
thanks, Brad
By Columbia on Sep 4, 2007 | Reply
Thanks for the tips, Hope it can uplift my income a little by using your tips.
By Mahesh Mohan on Oct 8, 2007 | Reply
Good points… and tricks….
By The AdSense Wizard on Dec 2, 2007 | Reply
Another tip would be to get more relevant ads. Besides section targetting you can help this with some simple SEO as in bolding keywords (but not too much!) but also header tags of course.
I wrote a short article about this on my blog at http://www.omalamarketing.com/2007/11/24/serving-relevant-and-well-paying-ads/
By Frugal Guy on Dec 9, 2007 | Reply
I don’t know. When I see “unbordered” ads that are over-blended, I immediately think “made for adsense” and run for the hills.
Perhaps I am just too sensitive to this type of thing? Maybe I just need to modernize my thinking a bit?
By neil strauss on Jan 7, 2008 | Reply
Good tips. It does require alot of trial and error and tweaks to get the best optimisation for the placement of adsense ads on the page.
One good tip is to make the font of your text the same or similar to those of adsense and also the colour of the links on the page the same as the adsense ads also.
By Solon Ohio on Feb 8, 2008 | Reply
Those are some great tips. I’m going to implement them on my website. However what I really need to increase my adsense income, is traffic!
By Norrie on Mar 6, 2008 | Reply
Thank you concise, very useful and easily understood. For a newbie a great help.
By The-Online-Quest on Mar 22, 2008 | Reply
Nice article, i followed your 1. Learn to blend your ads tips and i manage to earn 4% more, good post, im going to share this post on my blog
keep it up!
The-Online-Quest
http://djyano.blogspot.com
By Tomas on Mar 23, 2008 | Reply
Adsense must be above the fold! Then you will increase your CTR. Many people don’t know about this.
By Seth on Jun 14, 2008 | Reply
Great tips! AdSense is great, but lately I’ve been making more with WidgetBucks. In fact, I’ve been earning almost twice as much with WidgetBucks compared to AdSense. Plus, the ads are optimized for WordPress, Blogger, and even TypePad. Check out this WidgetBucks review for some more info.