Google

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Why you should put a leaderboard ad unit at the footer of your site

The advice for best result for your ads is to put it above the fold (the part of your page which is first seen by visitors without having to scroll down vertically. So some will have the impression that putting a leaderboard ad unit in the footer of a page is a bad idea as it is very much less visible, and the chances of the ads there being clicked on is very low. That is true. But from examination of my earning reports, CPM ads (cost per 1000 impressions) (click BACK button to get back to this page) are frequently displayed in the leaderboard ad unit in the footer. And even when there is no click on the ad, I get earning for the impression.

I didn't expect much clicks from the leaderboard in the footer because it is below the fold and less visible unless the visitor happens to be in an individual post page which is a short post. However, I see from my reports, there are still clicks on ads in leaderboard ad units in the footer. So why waste that opportunity? Put a leaderboard ad unit in the footer and earn from CPM ads and sometimes get some clicks too.

Friday, March 09, 2007

How to set up URL channels

You may have more than one sites displaying AdSense Ads for Content. You may want to see which site is performing better. To track this, you will have to set up URL channels. Then all the clicks and earnings coming from that site will be shown in the report. To set up URL channels, do the following steps:
1. Sign into your AdSense Account
2. Click the AdSense Setup
3. There will be 3 choices, AdSense for Content, AdSense for Search and Referrals. Click AdSense for Content.
4. Under the AdSense Setup tab, click "Channel"
5. Click "URL channels" (See screenshot below. Click to enlarge)
6. Click "Add new URL channels"
7. In the box, enter the URL's of the sites you want to track, one URL per line
8. Then click "Add channels" and you are done.

AdSense for Content URL channel

After that, you don't need to do anything, even when generating the scripts for your ads. You don't need to select the URL channel. You only have to select channels if you are using Custom channels

Monday, February 19, 2007

How to contact AdSense

This question often crops up in forums, so I will answer that here in a post. If you have a query regarding AdSense you can use their contact form at AdSense Help Center.

If you have accidentally clicked on ads on your own site, it is better to inform AdSense about it before they find out and perhaps ban you from AdSense. Or you may have installed AdSense click tracking program and have noticed suspicious activities. The contact form to inform AdSense about it is Invalid click contact.

Thursday, February 15, 2007

Thursday, January 11, 2007

Generating revenue from your blog via AdSense

What is Google AdSense


AdSense is the very successful advertising arm of Google which gets their revenue from displaying contextual ads (ads relevant to the content of the site). Because their text ads are usually relevant to the site, many people do not mind having their ads on their sites. Further, it may also be useful to the site visitors as it may point them to information that they are seeking.

Before Google AdSense came into the scene, site owners have to seek advertisers for their site and getting payment from the advertisers. Now, site owners need only sign up for an AdSense account, generate scripts, copy and paste them into the template to put contextual ads on their site, and Google take care of the rest. It is practically a paste and forget operation. Plus there are ways to earn from putting Google search box and from referrals. If you want a way for your visitors to search your site, you can use the Google sitesearh box, the script for pasting into your site can be obtained from your AdSense account. You can learn more about the various ways of earning from AdSense from the post

If you have a website, you can apply for an AdSense account by clicking on the text link "Generate revenue from your site. Google AdSense" at the top of the right sidebar. It normally take only a few days for them to approve your application.

If you don't have a website, starting a blog with Google Blogger is very easy and is free as long as you don't mind having the URL as a subdomain of blogspot.com. If you want your own domain name, you can always register a domain and either use Blogger's Custom Domain in which case you don't have to pay for hosting of your blog. You just have to pay the yearly renewal fee for the registration of the domain. And you can use the New Blogger template with the new features.

You can also use a third party to host your blog and use FTP (File Transfer Protocol) to publish your posts. In this case, the files are saved in your web host servers, and in addition to the yearly renewal fee of the domain, you will have to pay monthly/yearly hosting fees. At the moment, the New Blogger can only support blogs that use their own web host the use of the old classic Blogger template, and the new features of the New Blogger like Layout and drag and drop of the Page Elements (widgets) will not be available.

Different people have different needs and opinions and there are advantages and disadvantages of both, but I myself prefer to use the free blogspot.com for my blogs as then, I do not have to trouble myself with the renewal of the domain name fee and the hosting fee, plus if anything happened to me and I am not able to renew either, the blog will still be on the web.

If you are new to Blogger, this "online book" Dummies Guide to Google Blogger would be a good reference for you.

You can find help in clicking on the label "adsense" or using "adsense" as a search term in the sitesearch box of the following blogs to find help on how to generate the script for the AdSense ads, searchbox or referral text/buttons in the following blogs:

Dummies Guide to Google Blogger

Blogger Tips and Tricks

Testing Blogger Beta (now New Blogger)

and if you are still using the old classic Blogger template, at

Dummies Guide to Blogger