Ads

Google’s +1 On Adsense Ads: Demo Video!

Well the +1 button has even made it’s way on Adsense ads.. yes starting from October 2011 Google’s +1 button along with the people(your friends) who pressed this +1 button will be shown at the bottom of Adsense for Content ads and Adsense for Mobile Ads.

Example on Google’s blog:

For example, take Susan, who sees an ad for a good deal on flights. She +1’s the ad, thinking her friends might value this deal. Now, when Susan’s friends and contacts are signed in to their Google accounts, they’ll be able to see Susan’s picture across the bottom of the ad, with a note saying she +1’d it.

Susan’s friends and contacts will also be more likely to see the ad. While the dynamics of our ad auction aren’t changing, the ad will now be included in the auction for the pages Susan’s friends visit, as we know recommendations from friends can be a strong signal of an ad’s relevance.

Source: Adsense blog

My question is: will Susan click on the ad first or the +1 button ? If Susan click on the ad, then how can she click on +1 ? On the other hand, if Susan clicks on +1, then “how does she know if it’s a better product without even first visiting the site?”

So, basically this +1 will help big brands build up their tribe with these creative ads and recommend others to view it too. So I guess, this feature will increase the click through rates of big brands or recognized ads more and the one’s with highly creative ad.

Google Adword Promotional Ad
Google has already started showing Adword ads featuring this +1 and giving $75 for the first time users! Below is a video of the ad which appeared on our blog today.

To Opt-out of this feature: For publishers
Step 1: Log into your Adsense account.
Step 2: Click on “Try the new AdSense interface” at the top right corner.
Step 3: “Allow & block ads” tab.
Step 4: In the left hand sidebar, “Advanced settings” under Blocking options.
Step 5: Click on the check box, to enable or disable:

i. Interest-based Ads Preference: Show ads based on user interest categories. Visitation information from my sites may be used to help create interest categories.
ii. Third Party Ads Preference: Allow advertisers to use their audience information to deliver more relevant ads to my site.
iii. Social Ads Preference: Allow the use of +1 related features and social annotations in ads.

Adsense for Mobile:
I’m particularly interested in seeing how this could work on Adsense for Mobile ads. I’m so much into using my Xperia Arc and hence many android Applications.
It would be nice to have +1 in the adsense ads which are shown in these applications.

On mobile, the +1 button will replace the existing ‘g’ logo and recommendations will appear for several seconds, then fade out.

And no, clicking on +1 button won’t generate any revenue in your adsense account directly. Google hopes, it would increase the CTR(Click Through Rate) of your ads and hence your revenue will be increased.

+1’s will be one additional signal that help determine an ad’s relevance. All eligible ads will continue to compete in the ad auction, and we’ll continue to show the ones that will generate the most revenue for you. +1 button clicks are not counted as clicks on ads. Although you won’t receive any revenue for +1 button clicks, +1’s will help AdSense to deliver more useful ads to your users, which we think will result in higher returns over time.

For adword users though, it would help get more exposure. But the normal auctioning will continue..
As publishers we get the option to opt-in or opt-out of these Social Ad Preferences, so no complaining around. Opt-in or Opt-out, it’s left to you.

BuySellAds: Faster and Better(Show ads vertically with a click)

We all know that internally Google is thinking of considering site loading speed as one of the criteria for ranking the website. Apart form that, faster loading sites are key for grabbing user attention.

BuySellAds has come up with an innovative idea of making the javascript ad codes asynchronous(as they call it).

When any browser downloads the ad code that displays the ads, it blocks everything else on the page from rendering. And, while this process may take less than a second of the user’s time, it is noticeable and it is a big problem.

You can read more at BSA blog.

It is frustrating some times, when my visitors have to wait for the ads to load before they could see the entire page. Now I am happy as BSA is taking every effort to minimize that wait time. Infact, what I understand by reading their blog post, is that, with the new ad codes implemented visitors need not wait. i.e., the javascript codes as well as the other elements of the page load simultaneously. Thats great. So from now, we need not compromise user experience for making some pocket money(of course which is used for paying hosting and other expenses – coffee included!)

Faster is Ok, but I said “Better” in the title? It is because, a known issue for BSA publishers is alignment of the ads(problem with vertical alignment of ads). Now BSA has made it simpler. i.e., if we have implemented the new ad codes, now we can log into our BSA a/c, click on get code and make changes(make ads align vertical) and hit SAVE and the settings will be applied to the ad boxes on our site…..isn’t it better?

Additionally, you can even style your ads from within the BSA a/c – see below screen shot.

Previously we had to add float: left; to the a tag of the code. But people with no css knowledge what so ever, found it very geeky/confusing. So now, alignment of ads isn’t a problem with BSA ads.

If you had made any custom changes to the styling of your old code, then you need to add those changes to the new codes by applying them in the advance settings area in your BSA a/c.

Update:

To Show ads: 2 horizontal and the rest aligned vertically, you need to uncheck the vertical checkbox, and add float: left; to Anchor Style in the Advanced Settings of your BSA a/c. And don’t forget to SAVE the settings!

I highly recommend you to grab the new ad codes and make your site load faster.

Are You Puzzling Your Visitors/Readers? Check List

It was completely different, if you were already a big brand or a celebrity. People will be mentally connected to you and will bare the inconvenience and do the things which you want them to do! But if you are like most of us, then you will have to think from users perspective.

This is exactly what comes to my mind when I visit a website/blog which is filled with many “call to action!” – Are You Trying To Puzzle ?

For example, there are many News websites and entertainment websites which are so confusing that, we bloggers can observe them and take advantage of it, by not doing such things on our blog.

Some of the puzzling things
1. Display half a page or so – ads!, and some dozens of sponsored links above the fold.
Displaying a lot of coupon codes/discount coupons of various products(which may be invalid), to gain search engine visitors to those keywords.

what-to-do

2. Some 15 to 20 social media widgets – for you, to inform your friends, family and their dog about the website.
And some more widgets to join their fan clubs – 1 fan club is a good idea. 2 is ok. Anything above 3 or 4 is a bad idea.

3. Some flash ads and animated .gif banners.

4. Few pop ups and pop under and not to forget text link ads(like kontera – which you may see on our blog too! , Infolinks etc).

5. And its quite common that, they will be having many CPM ads on their site, and so they need us to refresh the pages and visit various pages on their site – and its easy, break the single article into two(or even more) and link to it at the bottom of the first article, and link back to the 1st page from the 2nd page, so on.

6. Having a pop up, asking you to signup for a news letter – and the popup having no exit option!

7. Some audio/video(some time, sponsored audio/video), auto-playing! and the visitor searching all the open tabs for the possible culprit(to shut-it-down).

8. One or the other contest going on, and you participating in it with half a mind, because the prize is so valuable but you haven’t seen them announcing a winner. When announced, there will be no clue about the winners existence.

9. And a funny thing – I saw a Twitter widget integrated on one of the famous entertainment site, which shows the recent tweets of some one at their office. I thought, they want to give some real time entertainment news to their visitors. But when I observed it closely, all the previous tweets from almost months were tweeted by some bot(automatic tweets!), and most tweets were out of topic. Ex:- I increased my Twitter followers by using this service, check them out. bla bla bla.

10. And what else or what not ? ha…they also have some syndicated contents!

Innocent mistake:
Even though they have all these puzzling things around, not all News/Entertainment sites are useless. There are sites, which have good quality content. But the thing is, they forget their main product. The basic element that they wanted to sell you. That is their content or any of their own product, say a DVD or CD or their magazine.

But when the ad revenue or the other benefits get bigger then their main product they may get distracted and may start puzzling their readers with more of what makes them profitable, for the time being.

Smart Planning and Execution:
I have seen some people not displaying any ads or banners on their site for many years, and finally they release their own product – they take time to bring up a exclusive, quality product, while building a group of target audience. Once the product is launched, some people will surly talk about it on their websites, forums etc.
Similarly when a already messy site adds one more mess to its sidebar, who cares about it? And so the site owner will continue with the puzzling act of make money, instead of concentrating on their product.

Are You A Big Brand or a Celebrity?
It was completely different, if you were already a big brand or a celebrity. People will be mentally connected to you and will bare the inconvenience and do the things which you want them to do! But if you are like most of us, then you will have to think from users perspective.

But then, Some Facts..
Also know the fact that, many of these news/entertainment sites have got premium publisher accounts. That means they earn a major share in the total earnings they generate, unlike the usual 50 – 50 or 30 – 50 or 60 – 50 ratios. Some ad networks even pay 80% to their premium publishers. Because if they can retain some key players, they are sure to retain their loyal followers too. But such sites will have multiple posters and many many many posts in their archive.
Blogs with single author or 2 or 3 authors will have a hard time building such a site. Instead, you can concentrate on building a community around the blog, who can stick around longer. So, you may have to stop puzzling your readers and build the community, authority, trust around your blog/brand.

The final take from this post is:
1. If you have any widgets/banner on your sidebar, then take some time now itself and remove them.
2. I believe, you have some call to action to your visitors. Like news letter signup, buy this button for your product etc. Focus on the main thing(s), rather than wanting your visitors to do all the things which you expect them to do.
3. Avoid forcing your visitors to take certain actions. Let them choose what they want to do and what they don’t.
4. Teach your visitors whats on your blog. Ex:- Twitter had a video explaining what Twitter is all about. Similarly, some people write and educate their readers about things like – What is RSS. What are the bubble links that they are seeing when they hover over certain words – intext ads etc.
5. Label the things properly: Label the things like, subscription form, Search form, News letter form, recent links, popular links, Sponsored link, advertisements etc.
6. choose a good niche and try to be on topic as far as possible. Think, what if your favorite politics blog suddenly started writing only about entertainment and traveling!
7. Let the design of your blog be simple and well structured. And load before your visitor forgets, what he was looking for!
8. Do some testing and know which widgets your visitors use frequently to share the content on your blog. Retain such things and remove the rest.
9.
10.

You may earn a dollar more today by puzzling/confusing/misleading your visitor, but remember, with that intention, you might have already missed a big opportunity. Better late then not, you can take action now and never miss an opportunity in the future.

What do you think of sites which try to puzzle visitors/readers. I have left point, 9, 10 empty. Would love to know your experience, in the comment section.

Know This Before Using Google Custom Search Engine

There are many advantages of adding Google Custom Search Engine to your wordpress blog.
Some are listed below..
1. People are used to search in Google.com and they will not find it difficult to do the same in your blog.
2. You can monetize the search results using Google Ads. [Optional]
3. Ability to give options for users, to search only our blog or the entire web.
4. We can know exactly what people are searching in our blog using the search engine.
5. Looks more professional. SERP can be hosted on our own site or Google.
6. Easy to integrate and use.
7. More features. We can include Refinements/Labels at the top of the result page.
8. Highly Customizable. We can customize the look and feel of the result page. We can put our logo instead of Google logo and link it back to our main site/blog. Font colour and the placement of ads can be controlled by ourselves.
9. We can control the type of ads appearing on our search result page, by including Search engine keywords, Site description etc. The ads will match to the keyword of search as well as to the keywords that we have included. We can even block competitors advertisements.
10. Can include the results from multiple sites/blogs.

Caution:-
We have seen many bloggers using CSE(Custom Search Engine) and their SERP(Search Engine Result Page) is violating the Adsense policy, by showing additional ads on the SERP.
Here is what Google has to say about it..

Can I show ads on AdSense for search results pages in my own site?

We ask that you don’t place any additional ads on pages with framed search results. However, you’re welcome to place an AdSense for search box on the page so your users can continue to search if they haven’t found what they’re looking for.

Now without wasting much of time, Create a CSE and put it on to your blog, if you haven’t done yet.
There are two ways to do this.
1. Login to your adsense account and goto “AdSense Setup” tab and click on “AdSense for Search”. Further instruction are self explanatory.
2. Goto Google Custom Search Engine and click on “Create a Custom Search Engine”.

The advantage of using the 2nd option is, we get “Advance setup features” and more customization options. So we recommend using CSE.

To connect your Custom Search Engine account with Google AdSense, visit the Make money tab in your search engine’s control panel.

Fill in the form with the email address that you use with your AdSense account, your zip code, and the last 5 digits of your phone number. Google will use this information to connect your Custom Search Engine account to your AdSense account and you can start making money immediately.

Now you make money by monetizing the search result page and your readers will be comfortable searching what they are looking for. So its a win-win situation 🙂

Some Adnetwork showing Adsense ads on its homepage!

As I was doing a bit of research about ad networks, and I found a ad network, which claims to be the best adnetwork.

When I visited their website, I saw Google Adsense ads on their homepage!
Now let me not mention its name and ruin its business.
Now how can you promote any product/service when yourselves don’t have 100% belief on your product/service.
When they use Adsense, that means Adsense gives more revenue then their ad network.
I know that this Adnetwork is only for some countries and they mainly target, contents that interests those country visitors- This is cool 🙂 .. But the cost per click is too low 🙁 .
Anyway, one of my personal opinion is– do not use your rivals products/service or competitors product/service and try to promote your service/product, people will never get confidence in your product/service if you do like this.
Many loyal customers may also turn their face from you. You should use your products/service and show others that you have full faith in what you are promoting/using/recommending. Be a model yourself, when it comes to using your products/services.
And many of you may think that, this ad network may be for those people who have been banned from Adsense. I guess, thats not at all true. Think from the perspective of the advertising company or the adnetwork company. Do you think that, they will prefer to have someone as their publisher, who have been banned from a reputed company(Google) for violating their terms? I know that many of you may say that Google banned me for no reason. But do you think people in the same business trust you? It is business…even if you are telling truth, they won’t care, as they don’t want to take any risk with their business(which involves so much of investment).
So I think, the proper way of promoting a product/service is to use it ourselves and show the rest, how to make use of it effectively.
I have learn’t a lot from different well-known adnetworks….they never use any advertisements on their website(atleast not from other networks!), as they do not want to redirect their customers to any other websites at any cost. <-- Hope you got these lines. I would never use any adnetwork or any advertisements on my website, if I am selling any of my products or services for money. It will be like killing a "hen which lays golden egg", if you use advertisements on a website(dedicated to sell your product/services) where you sell your own products/services. Love to know your opinion on this topic, in the comment section.