What is AdSense?

Google.com earns most of its revenue by allowing other website owners to advertise on their search result pages. All this is managed through a program they call AdWords.

Now you can earn a share of the revenue that Google earns from AdWords by displaying these same text ads on your site. In other words, you're helping Google advertise and they pay you a percentage of what they earn.

This program is called AdSense.

Every website owner should at least consider the program. Even if your site is just for information purposes, you can still participate and make decent money with AdSense -- or at least enough to fund your website.

So if you are one of those people that doesn't like the idea of paying for a site, this is an excellent way to earn your money back and then some.

Segment 20: Community & Testing

No man is an island, and having a supportive community is a great way to stay connected with other people who are seeking to make money online. In part 20 of my presentation, I discuss some great sites to bookmark for community.

Segment 19: AdSense Detective

Nothing is worse for an AdSense publisher than receiving the dreaded "closed for illegal clicks" email from Google. In part 19 of my presentation, I reveal a tool that can help protect you against this as well as provide you with the secret stats that Google doesn't show you.

Segment 18: Stats & Journals

It's important to keep track of your AdSense stats. One way to do this is by writing down the changes you make in a journal. In part 18 of my presentation, I demonstrate how this is done.

Segment 17: Google Sandbox

Part 17 of my presentation demonstrates how to use the AdSense sandbox, a great tool that will show you what kind of ads you may expect to appear on your site and/or individual pages. This is part 17 of my AdSense presentation.

Segment 16: AdSense Tip 4

It's part 16 of my AdSense presentation, where I provide in-depth examples of create your AdSense blocks. I show how to implement your AdSense color schemes and demonstrate options for putting ads on your site.

Segment 15: AdSense Tip 3b

In part 15 of my presentation, I go more in depth to the various color configurations you can use with your AdSense ads. Plenty of examples and "what not to do's" will help you navigate these options.

Segment 14: The Best AdSense Color

With Google's color palette, you can make your AdSense blocks look like any color of the rainbow. But are some color schemes better than others for generating revenue. In part 14 of my presentation, I begin discussing the best strategies for selecting colors.

Segment 13: Selecting The Right AdSense Blocks

Knowing which AdSense blocks to select and where to place them on your page is important if you want to maximize your AdSense revenue. In part 13 of my presentation, I discuss which blocks and page placements are the most effective.

Segment 12: Mistakes With AdSense

Making money with AdSense is easy, as long as you know how. Watch part 12 of my presentation and learn about the top 10 mistakes that people make when trying to make AdSense cash.

Segment 11: Building a Blog

Out of all the ways that exist to build a website, none is as simple as blogging. In part 11 of my presentation, I'll show you how easy it is to set up a blog using the tools that Google has provided. Ready to get started?

Segment 10: Apply For Adsense

Getting an AdSense account takes just a few minutes. In part 10 of my presentation, you'll learn how easy it is to get started with blogging and Google AdSense. Yes, it's that easy. Watch and learn!

Segment 9: Writing Content

Content is king on the web. If you want to make money with AdSense, start by building a content-rich site. In part #9 of my presentation, you'll learn why content is so important. In fact, you'll discover that content is not only king... it is Ka-ching!

Segment 8: Types Of Sites

There are a multitude of ways to build content-rich sites on the web. Every one of these ways can be used to build a loyal readership and generate revenue with Google AdSense. In part #8 of my presentation, I discuss various types of websites that you can create.

Segment 7: Blogs

Blogging is a great way to quickly build content for your web site and generate revenue with Google AdSense. In part 7 of my presentation, I demonstrate how easy it is to get started with blogging and AdSense.

Segment 6: Ways To Do Adsense

In part 6 of my AdSense presentation, I discuss the different ways that you can make money with AdSense. If you are just joining this series, you might want to start at part 1.

Segment 5: Pennies And Ebook

In part 5 of my presentation, I demonstrate how people have lost respect for the penny. When you understand the concept of "the AdSense tip jar", you can see how pennies quickly add up to become dollars. And in the period of one day, the seemingly innocent penny multiplies to become a fantastic source of passive income.

Segment 4: Adsense Start

When the AdSense program started in June 2003, I jumped on board hoping to make money with my content sites. I was in a for a rude awakening and gave up too easily. Nine months later I discovered that I had been leaving money on this table. In part 4 of my AdSense presentation, you'll find out how I "cracked" the AdSense code.

Segment 3: Adsense Introduction

In June 2003, Google singlehandedly breathed new life into the web when they introduced their AdSense contextual advertising program. What is Google AdSense? Find out in part 3 of my presentation.

Segment 2: Google And AdWords

In part #2 of my AdSense presentation, I discuss Google's AdWords program. Without advertisers, there would be no opportunity for publishers to make money with AdSense. As the flipside of the Google coin, AdWords is the engine that makes AdSense go. Watch this video and learn more.

Segment 1: Personal History

I presented my AdSense Secrets to a room of copywriters eager to learn how they could turn their writing into passive income with Google's contextual advertising program. This is part one of a multi-part series. This portion provides a bit of personal information.

4. Using Colors To Increase Your Clicks

4.1 Design Your Webs ite T o Highl ight Adsense

I once went to a fashion show where each model wore the exact same black
outfit for the entire duration of the show. Boring? Hardly! The show was
intended to showcase platinum jewelry, and the outfits were designed to
enhance the jewelry — instead of distracting the audience.

You don’t have to make all the pages on your website identical (or black).
But you do want to make sure that the look of your page draws attention to
the ads — and makes them appear as attractive and as valuable as platinum
jewelry.

Many websites have strong graphic elements that catch the eye — usually at the expense of the AdSense units.

If you're using AdSense, be judicious in the selection of fonts, font size,
colors, images, tables and other visual aspects of your website.

Draw subtle attention to your AdSense units. Make them the stars of
your show!



4.2 Make T he B order Go !

You can more than DOUBLE your click-throughs with this one simple
tweak!

Even before the Internet, ads in newspapers and magazines were marked off
with a thick, heavy border. No wonder borders and boxes have come to
symbolize advertising messages.



It's always easier to work with a white background. If your page
background is white, you can instantly see the results with the ad next to the color palette.

Ads with promin ent borders make your pages look cluttered. They distract
the eye from the ad text, while marking off the ad blocks from the rest of the
content.

Google provides an extensive color palette in your administrative area. U se it
to tweak the look of your ads to suit your web page.

With just one simple click, you can match the color of your ad's border w ith
the background color of you r web page. When the border blends with the
background, it frees up loads of space. The page looks instantly neater and
the ads look more inviting.

Make sure you also pick a match ing background color for the ad. The ad's
background must match the page background on which the ad will appear.

If the ad appears in a table, match the table background color with the ad
background color.

The key is to blend the background and border color with the page, so that
the text looks like an integral part of your web content.



Don't forget to match the background color for your ad with the background color of your web page. Even with a matching border, the ad in the sticks out against the white background.

4.3 Text Is D esign To o!
That's right: the text size, font, color and the color of your ads must match
the other text elements. If the text color of the ads is the same as the text in
the body of you r page, it’ll help the ads blend into the site and make the
reader feel that you’ve endorsed them.

And if the size of the font in the ads is the same as the size of the main body
of the content, it will have the same effect: they’ll l ook l ike part of your site
and not something brought in by Google.



That’s the sort of blending that translates into clicks.

This 3-way matching(titles, text and background) can generate excellent click-through rates.

Too many text styles add clutter and can confuse your visitors. Instead, try
every legitimate way to make the ads look like a part of your web content.
In other words use the colors to make sure that your ads don't look like ads!

4.4 Blue Is Best

So you want to get rid of the border. You want to get your ads the same
color as the text on the rest of your page and the background matching the
background color of your Web page.

But what about the link itself, the line the user is actually going to click?
What color should that be?

That’s an easy one: blue.

I used to say that all the text in the ad should match the text on your page,
including the link. After seeing an article about the benefits of keepin g the
links blue — and testing extensively — I don’t say th at any more.

The logic is that users have come to expect links on websites to be blue. Just
as they expect stop signs to be red and warning signs to be yellow, so they
expect thei r links to blue.

That means people are more likely to click on a blue link than a link
in any other color.

The line in your AdSense code that sets the color of your link is the one that
says:
Google_color_link = “# color”;

“#color” is the h exadecimal number for the color you want to use. You
should make sure that number is #0000FF.

Keep your lin k blue and you can experience an increase in cli ck-throughs as
high as 25 percent!

4.5 Where Did My URL Go ?

You can change the color of your text and you can make sure that your li nks
scream, “I’m a FREE road to where you want to go!”

But you still have to display the U RL. It’s one of Google’s rules. But you don’t
have to display it in a way that people can see it.

One legitimate tri ck to make the click-through link less obtrusive is to change
the URL display color to match the text description color. Now the link will
blend in with the text description and the eye will be drawn to the hyperlink
instead of the U RL. Google provides these tools for you . Why not use them?

Note that the 728 x 90 leaderboard and the 468 x 60 banner do not display
the URL line by Google’s design. It is not a mistake and you will not get in
trouble for the URL not appearing w ith these ad blocks. It’s just the way it
is.

4.6 Deliberate Mismatching

When it comes to choosing colors, I recommend 3-way matching and using
blue for the links. But there is another strategy that you can use.

You can deliberately mismatch your ad colors and styles, provided you keep
it to the top of your page.

This distinction generates two powerful ' zones' and therefore two types of
experience for the visitor.

The first zone is always at the top of the first page, above the main site banner. The titles and text colors match colors found in the banner graphic heading.(Important — the URL links are hidden, so only certain text ads wil l
allow you to do this.)

The end result is that these ads, placed above the banner graphic look l ike key control points for your site and are just more likely to be clicked. The visitor feels that they are visiting another major area of that site.



4.7 Changing The Look Of Your Ads

The strategies I’ ve provi ded in this chapter will all help to improve your
clickthrough rates. That’s what happened when I used them and it’s w hat
happened when other people used them.

But one of the most important strategies you can use with AdSense i s to
experiment.

If you find that a slightly larger ad format gives you better results, for
example, then obviously, you should use the bigger one.
In the past, changing your ads meant copying the code and pasting it into
your site again.

Today, things are a bit easier than that.

When you create your ad code, you’ll be asked to give that code a n ame.
Make su re that name tells you exactly w here the ad will be placed and its
format.

Whenever you want to change the way an ad looks, you’ll be able to pu ll u p
that code on your AdSense center and make the changes. Your ad will be
updated automatically within the next ten minutes.

Unless you want to change the size of your ads. That you’ll still have to do
manually by pastin g in the new code.

3. How To "Tweak" Your Ads To Make Them

The choices can be overwhelming. Many people let Google decide for them-
preferring to stick with the default settings. Big mistake! From my own
experience I can tell you that it’s like swapping a hundred-dollar bill for a
ten-dollar one.

For almost one year I settled for just a tenth of what I could have been
making — just because I didn’t bother to control the looks and placement of
my AdSense ads.

The various ad formats, colors and their placement on th e web page can be
done in thousands of combinations. You can literally spend hours every day
experimenting with every possi ble combination. But you don’t want to, do
you?

Let me give you a few ‘ground rules’ that have sky-rocketed the CTRs on my
top-grossing pages:

3.2 Don't "Loo k" Like An Ad

People don't visit your website for ads. They w ant good content.

If you make the ads stick out w ith eye-popping colors, images or borders,
that makes them easy to recognize as ads — and people w ork extra hard to
avoid them.
The same goes for ads that are tucked away in the top, bottom or some
other far corner of the page. So easy to ignore!

If you want people to click, make the ads look like an integral part of your
content.

Today's visitors are blind to banners, mad at pop-ups, weary of ads and
skeptical of contests and giveaways. So how do you win their confidence?
Simple. Don't make your ads look like ads!

Let’s begin by reviewing each of the different types of ad available from
AdSense and explaining their uses... then I’ll introduce you to a few simple
choices that zoomed my CTRs to incredible heigh ts.

3.3 Meet the AdSe nse Family

Google serves its ads in several flavors, with each of those flavors coming in
a range of different shapes and sizes. It is very important to understand the
differences between each of these ads. Some are ideal for particular
locations. Some should never be used in certain locations. And some should
be used very rarel y—if at all.

The sample page at www.google.com/adsense/adformats
lets you see all of the different kinds of ads at once. It even has links to sample placements that demonstrate h ow the ads can be used.

For the most part, I’d recommend that you ignore those sample placements.

I’ll talk about l ocation in more detail later in the book, but for now just bear
in min d that many of the ads in the samples are just too out of the way to be
noticed.

You can use them as a starting point if you want but you’ll save yourself a lot
of time — and money — by taking advantage of the experience of myself and
others, and following the recommendation s here.

3.4 Text Ads — Google’s Finest

Text ads are probably the types of ad that you’re most familiar with. You get
a box containing one or a number of ads with a linked headline, a brief description and a URL . You also get the “Ads by Google” notice that appears
on all AdSense ads. (Google changed this notice recently and it now blends in
much better than it used to.)

There are eight different types of text ad. The most popular is probably the
leaderboard. At 728 x 90, it stretches pretty much across the screen and
while it can be placed anywhere, it’s mostly used at the top of the page,
above the main text.



That’s a great location. It’s the first thing the reader sees and it offers a good
selection of ads to choose from. When you’re just starting out and still
experimenting with the types of ads that work best with your users, it’s a
pretty good default to begin with.

Of course, you can put it in other places too. Putting a leaderboard ad
between forum entries for example can be a pretty good strategy sometimes
and definitely worth trying. On the whole though, I think you’ll probably find
that one of the smaller ads, such as a banner or half-banner might blend in
more there and bring better results.

And I think you can often forget about putting a l eaderboard at the bottom of
the page, despite what Google’s samples show you. It would certainly fit
there but you have to be certain that people are going to reach the bottom of
the page, especially a long page. You might find that only a small minority of
readers wou ld get that far, so you’re already reducing the percentage of
readers who would click through.

Overall, I’d say that leaderboards are most effective blended into the top of
the page beneath the navigation bar and sometimes placed between forum
entries.



Banne rs(468 x 60) and half-banners(234 x 60) are much more flexible.

Like leaderboards you can certainly put these sorts of ads at the top of the
page, and lots of sites do it. Again, that’s something worth trying. You can
put up a leaderboard for a week or so, swap it for a banner for another week
or so, and compare the results.



But at the top of the page, I’d expect the leaderboard to do better.

A banner or a half-banner w ould leave too much space on one side and make
the ad stand ou t. It would look li ke you’ve set aside an area of the page for
advertising instead of for content. That would alert the reader that that
section of the page is one that they can just ignore.

When you’re looking for an ad to put in the middle of the page though, a
half-banner can be just the ticket.

While a leaderboard will stretch over the sidebars of your site, just like the
navigation bar, a 2 34 x 60 half-banner w ill fit neatly into the text space on
most sites.

This sort of ad should be your default option for the en d of articles and the
bottom of blog entries.

But for the most part, stay away from the 468 x 60 banner ad block!

One of the first things people do wh en they sign up for AdSense is to grab a
468 x 60 ad block.

Big mistake.

I have a theory about why they do this. It’s the same theory that explains
why the 468 x 60 block does not entice clicks.

Most site owners have the mindset that when they put Google ads on their
site, they must place the code that conforms most to traditional web
advertising. And that would be...? Yup, the 468 x 60, the ubiquitous bann er
format that we have all come to know and love and... IGNORE.

Everyone is familiar with the 468 x 60. And that’s exactly why the click-
through rate on this size is very low , even among advertisers who use
images on their banners.

The 468 x 60 blocks screams, " Hey! I am an advertisement! Whatever you
do, DON'T click me. In fact, you should run from me as fast as you can!"
In all but a few special cases, I have found the 468 x 60 ad block to be
completely ineffective, and recommend ignoring it the same way your visitors
do.

Now, that doesn’t mean you can never use it. You just have to know w hat you’re doing and do it smartly. You have to do everything you can to make
sure that that ad block looks absolutely nothing like a traditional banner ad.

At my site, WorldVi llage.com, I’ve done that by su rrounding the ad with text.
Because there’s no border around the unit, th e ads blend into the text and
look almost as they’re a part of the article.

If I had left that unit in the middle of some empty space — at the top of the
page for example — it would have looked exactly like the sort of banner that
users have trained themselves to avoid. It wouldn’t have picked up any clicks
at all.

(Note, I could probably have used a half-banner here too but in general, I
like to give my users as wide a choice of ads to click as possible. )

While this use of a 468 x 60 works for me — and it can work for you too if
you blend it into the page properly — I’d stick to other formats, like the, half-
banner if you’re not 100 percent sure that you can pull it off.

When this ad unit fails, it can fail big.

Google also offers six different kinds of rectangular ads:
buttons(125 x 125), small rectangles (180 x 150), medium rectangles(300 x 250), large rectangles(336 x 280), and two sizes of squares 250 x 250 and 200 x 200.

In fact, all of th e rectangles can be slotted into the same spots on the page...
with the exception of the button.

Probably the most common use of rectangles is at the beginning of articles.
You can wrap the text around the ad, forcing the reader to look at it if he
wan ts to read the article. That’s very effective.

But you can really put these sorts of ads anywhere on the page. On my site,
DealOfDay.com, I’ve put tw o rectangular ads righ t at the top of the page so
that they take up the bulk of the space the user sees before he starts to
scroll. That’s a very aggressive approach that might not w ork on every site.
It’s w orth trying though because if it works for you , you can find that it
brings in great revenues.

If you’re wondering which size of ad wou ld be best for the position you’ve got
in mind, my advice is to start with the large rectangle, the 336 x 280.



Why should you choose the 336 x 280 ad block? Simple. It gets the most
clicks! My studies have show n that this format looks most like real content
added to a page. I’ve dabbled with every size Google offers and this is the
size that consi stently has the best results. Other people have told me the
exact same thing. Th at’s all I need to know!

Second best is the 300 x 250 rectangle.



This ad block si ze is really usefu l wh en you want to have two sets of ads side
by side. They fit on most web pages just perfectly.



Buttons should generally be used in a different way to other rectangles. Like the half-banners, they’re distinctive for their small size. Wh ile th at means you could slot them in anywhere, I think they work best when slipped into
the sidebars.

For example, you might have a list of links to frequently-read articles or
other sites on one side of your page. Putting a button ad at the end of a list
like that could help it to blend in well.

The final types of text ads are those that run verticall y. These come in three
sizes: skyscraper (120 x 600), wide skyscraper (160 x 600) and vertical banner (120 x 240).

Clearly, these are useful options for filling up the sides of the page.

I would also recommend using the 'w ide skyscraper', text-only ads on the
right hand edge of the screen — in conjunction with the 3-Way Matching I
discuss later in the book.

If you think about it, nearly al l PC users are right handed ( even left-handed
people li ke me control their mouse with th eir right hand because it's how we
were 'brought up' to use a mouse.) By placing the ads on the right han d
edge it's psychologically 'less distance' between your right hand and the
screen.

This 'closeness' in my opinion makes th e user feel more comfortable and
therefore more likely to click through to a link. They feel more in control of
their visit experience.

On the whole, you can often divide sites into those that have plenty of
content at the sides (especially on some blogs), and those that have nothing
on the sides (like at J oelComm.com).

I think putting vertical ads in space so that they form the border of the main
text makes the page look a lot cleaner. But that doesn’t necessarily mean
that they’re goin g to get more clicks. If you’re puttin g a vertical banner in an
area where you have other content then just make su re, as always, that you
blend them in well so that they look like the rest of your content.

3.5 Image Ads — Built To Be Ignored

Text ads should always be your first pick when you start to load up your site.
Image ads should always be your last choice.
A text ad offers many advantages over image ads:

A. With the right formatting, a text ad 'blends in' with your site
content. An image ad will not give you the same freedom w ith its
appearance, as the only thing you can play with is the size and
posi tioning.

B. You can squeeze more text ads into the space that a conventional banner takes. People love to have more choices!

C. Properly formatted text ads don't look like clutter. Bann ers do!

D. People hate banners and avoid them at sight. Many tests con firm that peopl e are much more receptive to text ads related with your content.

I just can’t think of a reason why anyone w ould want to take an image ad
from Google. Text ads perform so much better, in my opini on, you’re better
off sticking with those and ignoring image ads altogether.


3.1 Ad Formats: “Dress” your ads for success!

This banner ad stands out, but will it get clicked? Dave Taylor, best-sel li ng
technology writer and AdSense partner, stands up for text ads in this article at: http: / /ww w.free-web -money.com/000449.html You can read more of his AdSense articles on this page.

3.6 Video Ads

There is however, one type of image ad that you should welcome on your
website: Google’s video ads.

These are an excel lent addition to Google’s inventory and for si tes th at get
them, they can bring very impressive returns.

Instead of receivi ng the sort of stati c image that just gets ignored, you’ll
recei ve the opening still of an online video. The video is stored on Google’s
servers so your downl oad times won’t be affected, and it only plays when the
user clicks the Play button, minimizing distraction to the user.

That’s a good thin g. If a user’s eyes keep drifting to a moving image wh en
he’s trying to read your content, he’s going to get pretty frustrated and not
wan t to come back.



And it’s fine too i f you’re being paid on a CPM basis; you won’t care then how
often someone sees the video. But you’re not always paid on a CPM basis;
you might also be paid on a CPC basis.

Unlike Google’s other ad formats though, you won’t be paid for just one click.
Users first have to click the Play button—which won’t pay you a dime—and
then click either the screen while it’s playing or the link underneath the
screen before you’ll earn money.

In fact, you can’t even track the number of times the film is shown.
(Althou gh that does mean that you can watch the film yourself without
getting rude messages from Google, and it also means that CPC advertisers
are less likely to get free branding at the expense of your page space.)

That extra step might sound like it’s going to hit your clickthrough rate for
that ad u nit but I’m not sure that’s true.

As soon as someone sees a button anywhere, they want to click it. In fact,
I’m sure th at if you put a big notice next to the Pl ay button saying, “DO N OT
PU SH THIS BUTTON” you can be sure th at your clicks would go through the
roof. (But don’t try it; i t’s unlikely that Google will appreciate it.)

People will want to click that Play button, and many of them will want to
learn more about the company that created the ad. And even if your CTR
does drop for that unit, it’s likely that the click price for video ads will be
higher than for other units competing for that space.

Video ads are more expensive to create than text or image ads. That’s why
they tend to be created by big companies li ke car giants or Disney. They
might even be offering their televi sion ads. If those corporations have gone
to the trou ble creating an original video ad or formatting a televi sion ad for
the Web, there’s a great chance that they’ll go to the trouble of outbidding
their nearest rival for exposure.

If you’re getting a video ad, track how long it appears on that page
and compare the revenues it brings with the days on which no video
ad appeared. You should expect to see a spike in earnings.If you don’t
see that spike, you can always opt out.

Unlike text or image ads though, there’s no guarantee you’re going to get a
video ad. To qualify, you have to be opted in to receive image ads on an ad
unit in one of these sizes:

• Medium Rectangle (300x250)
• Large Rectangle (336x280 )
• Square (2 50x250)
• Small Squ are (2 00x200)
• Leaderboard (28x90)
• Skyscraper (120x600)
• Wide Skyscraper (160x600)

(It’s w orth noting that with video ads, the bigger the format, the better the
results).

If you’re recei ving those kinds of image ads and AdSense has a video ad to
match you r content, you might receive one.

But what if you don’t? You’ll be receiving the sort of image ads that earn a
poor clickthrough rate. That would cost you money.

There are two things that you can do to minimize any losses from fishi ng for
video ads and not gettin g them.

The first is to stop fishing fast. If a w eek has gone by and your image ad unit
hasn’t acquired a Play button, it’s probably not going to. So turn that image
ad back into a text ad.

The second is to follow the strategy I use at DealofDay.com. I’ve placed two rectangular ads at the top of the page to make the m unmissable but one of them is an image ad.

Google no longer allows publishers to place related images right next to ad
units to draw attention to them but you can put an i mage ad next to a text
ad. If that image ad becomes a video ad, you’re going to earn more money.
If it stays an image ad, it’s going to pull eyes into your ad zone.
This is about the only time I can think of when an image ad might be better
than a text ad.

And when you do get video ads, there are also a couple of things that you
can do to make the most of them...

Adding video to your Web pages for example, is a breeze. There are millions
of clips available for free use on the Web, and there’s nothing to stop you
from shooting your own short.

If your site regularly receives a video ad from AdSense, placing one
or two more videos on those pages would help the ad blend into the
site and increase clicks.

You could also encourage advertisers to build their own video ads specifically
for your site. In Chapter 6, I talk about Google’ s “Advertise on this site”
feature and recommend that you make use of the landing page to help
advertisers create effective ads for your site. You could also add a line or two
there about video ads.

Video ads are still fairly new on AdSense, but I’m real ly excited about them. I
think we’re going to be seein g a lot more of them in the future and they’re
going to really prove their worth.

3.7 Gadget Ads — Clever But Are They Effective?

I’m optimistic about video ads. I’m not sure yet about Gadget ads.

These are rich media ads that might contain animation, Flash games and
interactive content. At the moment advertisers are big brands li ke Coca-Cola
and I suspect it’s likely to stay that way. Ads like these cost a lot more to
design and program than a text ad, a graphic ad or even a home-made video
ad.

They can pay by impression or by click but I’m skeptical that you’ll get many
clicks. An early test showed that only a third of one percent of viewers
actually interacted with the ad.

The problem is that they just look too much like ads. Most users have learnt
to ignore them.

If you do want to test them though, you’ll need to opt in to receive image
ads. Apparently the most popular sizes for gadgets are rectangles,
leaderboards and skyscrapers.

Some ads might do well — such as those for movies or which have an
attractive built-in game — but on the whole, I expect you’ll find that a w ell-
blended text ad unit will do better.

3.8 Link Units — Great Little Stocking Fillers

An ad format that has already proved its worth, when used correctl y, is link
units.

If you’ ve ever bough t Christmas presents for children, you’ve probably
bought stocking fillers. You dole out hundreds of bucks on some state-of-the-
art electronic gizmo, toss in a couple of toy cars that cost a dollar each just
to fill up space and give the kid more to unwrap... then watch him spend 90
percent of his time pl aying with the car that cost 10 percent of your total gift
budget.

Ad Link units have the potential to be equally profitable.

They’re very small, almost unnoticeable... but when used well, they can be
extremely effective.

Ad Link units let you place a box on your site that contains four or five links.
They come in sizes ranging from 20 x 90 to 200 x 90, and are really meant
to be placed on a sidebar.

Because you can place both Ad L ink units as well as other ad units on th e
page, you might find that the choice helps: if a u ser doesn’t spot something
interesting in one type of ad block, he might spot it on another.

Where Ad Links differ from other types of ads is that they only display a list
of topics that Google believes are relevant to the con tent of your pages. They
don’t display the ads themselves. When a visitor clicks on a topic, Google
pops up a new window with targeted ads.

It can be argued that the Ad Links are ineffective becau se like video ads,
people have to go through two clicks in order for you to get paid. That’s
right, once again, you’re only getting pai d for the second click (but that does
mean you can check to see which ads your users are being served.)



How would you like your ads served? Banners? Skyscrapers? Rectangles? Squares? What about borders and background colors? But it can also be argued that if someone is
taking the time to click on a topic, then they are probably very in terested in the link, an d are likely to click an actual adverti sement on the resulting page. Some people h ave found that just about everyone who clicks on an Ad Link w ill click on the ads that appear on the next page. I have tested Ad Links on multiple sites and
have seen vast differences i n results. That makes it more difficult to say whether or not they are for you.

The results were nothing to write home about. Let's just say that you could just
about buy a large candy bar with the CPM I saw.

In the second case, I placed the Ad Links on a product specific site with a
narrow audience. The results were fantastic! We're talking about a CPM that
is greater than what someone might make flippi ng burgers in one day.

The conclusions should be obviou s. If you’re going to use an Ad Links un it
campaign. You need to put them:

1. On a site with a specific field of interest. A general site will give you general ads — and few clicks.
2. Above the fold with few other links.For Ad Links, this is crucial: If your users are going to click a link, it should be a link that gives you
money.

It’s also a good idea to keep your Ad L ink units for sites with high-paying
keywords. If someone comes to your site seeking out information or a
product on a top-notch keyword, they tend to be more likely to click as a result.

There are two kinds of link units: vertical units and horizontal units.
Vertical lin k units are great slotted into sidebars. They just look like a natural
extension of the link list.

But horizontal link units can be at least as effective. Since they were
introdu ced, they really have become an extremely useful tool.

Some users have reported in creases in CTR as high as 200 percent using
these units!

Instead of piling the links one on top of the other—which is great for putting
above lists of links but stand out too clearly when placed in text—the
horizontal ads blend i n perfectly when placed on pages with articles.


Horizontal Ad Link units are great for inserting into articles and show very
clearly which keywords your site is generating.

You can still on ly use one Ad Link unit per page and users still have to click
twice before you get paid but they’re definitely worth slipping into a long
arti cle. You probably shouldn’t put them at the bottom of a page where
they’ll be very easy to miss, but there are plenty of other places where these
sorts of ads can work very, very well.

For example, a horizontal ad unit can be a great alternative to a leaderboard.
It’s much more subtle and takes up less space on the page — definitely
something to experiment with to see whi ch of the two brings you the highest
revenues.

Or you could use them to separate forum or blog en tries. As a horizontal
unit, they can be very effective as frames that give people somewhere easy
to go when they reach the end of a text unit.

One great use for horizontal link units though is on directory pages. If you
have a Web page that contains tables of links, slipping a horizontal link unit
above or below them — or both — can make the ads look like a part of the
directory.

3.9 Expanded Text Ads — Shrinking Control Or Expanded
Income?

Take a look at the ad format samples on the AdSense site and you’ll see a bunch of squares and rectangles filled with ads. Most of those ad units will contain more than one ad. On those units that do contain just the one ad, like the button or the half-banner, the ad will fill the space neatly and look pretty subtle.



You might be surprised then to put a skyscraper or a leaderboard on your site and find just one giant ad,written in super-sized text.

All the effort you’ve put into picking th e right ad for your si te, testing to see
which formats work best and calculating which will give you the most clicks
will have gone ri ght out of the window.

You’ve prepared your site to serve multiple ads that l ook li ke content, and
instead you’re handing out a sin gle ad that just screams “Don’t click me!”

This can happen sometimes, but it’s not a reason to panic. It might even be
a reason to celebrate.

There are two possible reasons that Google is sending you these expanded
text ads.

The first possible reason is that you’ve been keyword-targeted. Google keeps
track of your results (just like you should be doing) and tries to serve up the
number of ads for your page that will bring in the h igh est amount of income.
That might be four ads in a unit. Or just the one.

Frankly, I’m a touch skeptical that showing one ad is going to brin g me more
revenues than showing several. But I’m prepared to give AdSense the benefit
of the doubt.

If I see that Google i s giving me one ad, I’ll compare the results for that one
ad to the previous results that I’ve had serving multiple ads in the same unit.
If I find that my revenues have dropped I can either block that ad using my
filters or just ask AdSense not to give me any more single ads.

But if I find that the expanded text ad is giving me more money, I migh t still
be worried. I know that users are more likely to click ads that look like
content. I also know that they prefer to have a choice of ads rather than ju st
one option.

If I’m getting more clicks then with just one ad, it could well be that I have
been doing something w rong with that ad unit in the past. I w ould want to
look at how well it’s been optimized and whether it’s in the right place to
bring in the best income.

It could well be th at this single ad is a high-payer and works better with little
competition. But it could also be that getting that one ad is a warnin g that
something was wrong with the way you ’ve laid out that ad unit on your site.

You might want to try some different strategies to see if they’ll increase your
revenues when the multiple ads come back.

There is another possibility though. You migh t have been placement-targeted.

This is a whole different ball game. It means that an advertiser has spotted
your si te and asked Google to run thei r ads on it.

In the past, they could onl y do that on a cost-per-mille(CPM) basi s. You
received a set fee for every thousand impressions.

Because you were no longer dealing with tempting people to click, you didn’t
care how much your ad looks like an ad. In fact you might even want it to
look like an ad, if that’s what will keep the advertiser happy.

That’s no longer the case. Now advertisers can also place ads on cost-per-
click basis. That means you sh ould still blend your units into the page so that
they don’t look like ads.

The most important point to bear in mind here i s that you want to make sure
that you’re not losing mon ey. It might be very nice for the advertiser to have
exclusive control over a particular spot on your page but if you can make
more money serving CPC ads in that space, then you need to make sure that
your si te is working for you and not for the advertiser.

Again, watch your stats for a week and see if the revenues you receive for
your impressions are higher than those you receive for your clicks.

Most publishers do find that ads that placement targeted ads — even those
that pay on a CPM basis — pay better, especially sites with h igh traffic rates.
After al l, you’re getting paid for every vi sitor who comes to your site rather
than ju st those that click, so all you have to do to increase your revenue is
increase your traffic. As long as each impression pays more than you’re
paying for the traffic, you’re going to be making a profit. That should be easy
to calculate.

If you find the revenues are lower though, then you’ll want to boot that ad
off and go back to serving conventional ads. You can do that by opting out of
showing placement-targeted ads (you’re automati cally opted in) or even
better, use the Review Center to block selected advertisers.

In general, the biggest probl em with these sorts of campaigns is not lower
revenues; it’s that you’ve got no idea how long they’re going to last, which
makes it difficult for you to take advantage of them. If you knew, for
example, that you were going to get paid per impression for the next tw o
weeks, then you ’d want to buy in as much traffic as possible for that period,
provided that you were paying l ess than you were earning.

And because you wouldn’t care about CTR for those CPM campaigns, You
could also lay off the optimization and focus on making your site more
attractive to users.

But you can’t tell w hen your site is going to be used for a CPM campaign and
you can’t tell how long it’s going to last either. That means th ere’s little point
in making major changes to your optimization; you might have to rebuild it
the next day.

The best strategy then w hen you spot a placement-targeted ad on your site
is to keep a close eye on the cash flows. Buy in more traffic if you can do it
profitably but for the most part, just enjoy the extra income!

2. AdSense — Making The Money!

Once you’ve done all this, you’ll be ready to start using — and profiting from
— AdSense. I’m going to talk you right through the process of signing up to
AdSense from reaching Google to being ready to place your first ad.

If you’ ve been putting off signing up until you get time to figure out how to
do it, you’ve just run out of excuses!

2.1 What Is AdSense?

Before signing up to AdSense, it’s important to understand what you’re
signin g up to. Many of the principles and strategies th at I describe in this
book make the most of th e way that AdSense works. If you can understan d
where AdSense are getting their ads, how they assign those ads to Web
pages and how they fix the prices for clicks on those ads or for ad
appearances on those pages, you’ll be in a great position to manipulate
AdSense in a way that gives you maximum revenues.

Unfortunately, I can’t really do that.

Much of the way that Google runs the AdSense program is kept under wraps.
I know a few things — and enough to do a great deal with our AdSense ads.
But I don’t know it all. N o one outside Google does. And for good reason. If it
was clear how Google figured out the content of each w ebsite and which ads
suit that site best, there’s a good chance that the Web would be fi lled with
sites created specially to bring in the h igh est paying ads instead of sites built
to bring in and inform users.

People do try to build sites for ads not content, but they tend to make less
money than high quality sites that attract loyal users who click on ads.

The fact is, w e can make the most of both AdSense and our own ad space
without knowing the algorithms that Google uses to assign ads and pay sites.

That’s because AdSense is pretty simple. At the most basic level, AdSense is a service run by Google that places ads on websites. When you sign up to AdSense, you agree to take the ads that Google gives you and receive a fee each time a user clicks on that ad (or for each thousand ad appearances the ad receives on your site, depending on the type of ad).

The ads themselves come from another Google service: AdWords.

If you want to understand AdSense, you will need to understand AdWords.

Adverti sers submit their ads to Google using the AdWords program. They
write a headline and a short piece of text — and here’s where it gets
interesting — they choose how much they want to pay.

Advertisers decide on the size of their advertising budgets and the amount
they’re prepared to pay for each click they receive. Google then decides
where to put those ads.

So a company that has a websi te selling handmade furniture might create an
ad that looks like this:



The company’s owner might then say that he’s prepared to pay $1000 a
month for his adverti sing budget but not more than $1 for a click. He can be
certain now of getting at least a thousand leads a month.

But that’s where his control over the ad ends. Google will figure out which
sites suit an ad like that and put them where it sees fit, charging the
advertiser up to a dollar a click until the advertiser’s budget runs out. (Of
that dollar, how much the publisher receives is a Google secret.
The New York Times has reported Google pays publ ishers 78. 5 percent of the
advertising price per click. The figure hasn’ t been confirmed but it is around
what most peopl e in the industry expect that Google pays.)

That makes AdWords different to more traditional form of advertising. In the
print world, an advertiser chooses where it wants to place its ads and decides
if the price is worth paying.

The newspaper too decides how much it wants advertisers to pay to appear
on its pages. Any advertiser that meets that price gets the slot and the
publisher always knows how much his space is worth.

Neither of those things is true online.

When an advertiser signs up to AdWords, he has no idea where his ads are
going to turn up. When you sign up to AdSe nse, you’ve got no idea
how much you’re going to be paid for the ad space on your page.

You leave it to Google to decide whether to give you ads which could pay just
a few cents per click or ads which could pay a few dollars per click.

Google says that it always assigns ads in such a way that publishers
receive maximum revenues, and that adv ertisers get the best value
for the ir money .

So if you have a site that talks about interior design and which mentions
“homemade furn ishings” a great deal, Google will assume that your readers
will be interested in the sample ad above. But that won’t be the only ad that
could appear on you r page. There could be dozens of others. Google will give
you the ads that it thinks wi ll give you the highest revenues.

That might not be the ad with the highest possible click price though. If a
low er paying ad gives you more clicks and high er overall revenues, you
should find yourself receiving that ad instead.

In theory then, you could just leave it to Google to decide which ads to give
you and at which price.

In my experience though, that just cuts you out of a giant opportun ity. You
can influence the choice of ads that you get on your page, both in terms of
content and in terms of price. You can certainly influence the number of
clicks you receive on those ads. Google l eaves that entirely up to you — and
it’s a crucial part of the difference between earni ngs that pay for candy bars
and earnings that pay for cars.

In short then, while signing up for AdSense can be both the beginning and
the end of turning your site into income, if you’re serious about making
serious money with your site, it needs to be the beginning. You’ll w ant to
make sure you’re not getting low-paying ads, and you’ll want to make sure
that you’re getting the clicks that turn those ads in to cash.

If you want an in-depth look at Google AdWords, I recommend Perry
Marshall’s training materials.

2.2 Signing Up Made Easy

First though, you have to sign up. H ere’s how you do it.

The sign-up page asks for a relatively small amount of information, not all of
which is as obvious as you might like.

First, you’ll have to tell Google w hether you want an “individual” account or a
“company” account — whether you’re a company with more than twenty
employees or practically a one-man show that’s just you and up to nineteen
others. That’s important for just one reason: it tells Google w here to send
the money. Take a business account and the payments wi ll be made in the
name of your company; take an individual account, and they’ll be paid
directly to you.

You’ll also be able to choose between three different ways of receiving your
money: Electronic Funds Transfer, local cu rrency check or Secured Express
Delivery.
In general, it’s better to get your money by direct deposit
using the Electronic Funds Transfer; Google charges for express mail
checks.

(What you won’t be able to choose is whether you’re paid per click—on a
“CPC” basis—or for every thousand times you show an ad—on a “CPM ” basis.
Google decides that for you. Some ads w ill be CPC and others will be CPM.)



The next piece of information that Google demands is your URL. There’s only
room for one URL, which can be confusing if you have more than one site
and want to put AdSense on all of them. Don’t worry about it. It won’t affect
how you use AdSense at all, so just submit your biggest site for now.

The next question is about whether you want content-based ads — the type
of smal l text ads I’ve been discussin g so far, search ads or both.
(Content-based ads are better but I’ll tell you how to benefit from each so I
re comme nd that you choose both.)

Once you’re approved, you’ll just have to copy and paste a small piece of
code into your website and you’re done!

2.3 Googl e Policies

AdSense works. I know it works because I’ve got the stats, the checks and
the bank balance to prove it. And all of the methods that I u sed to increase
my AdSense revenu es were completely legitimate and in line with Google’s
policies.

That’s important. It is possible to cheat AdSense. But you’d h ave to be crazy
to do it. You can make so much money working w ithin Google’s rules that to
risk getting thrown out by putting ads on pages without content or by
persuading users to click on the ads is just plain crazy.

I’ve put a detailed list of Google’s “do’s and don’ts” at the back of this book.
The things to look out for in particular are:

Code Modification
You have to paste the AdSense code onto your si te as is. And you don’t need
to do anything else! Your AdSense account will let you play with colors and
placements (and getting those right is what will really rocket your income) so
why bother playing with Google’s H TML? It’s not necessary and it could get
you a l ifeti me ban.

Incentives
When the ads appear on your page, you have to leave them completely
alone. You might be tempted to tell your users to “click here” or support your
sponsors but if Google catches you, they could well cut you off. They want
people to click becau se they’re genuinely interested in the ad. Get your
strategy right and they’ll do just that.
You can encourage your users to download the products your referral buttons
promote or to use you r search bar, but never encourage your users to click
your ads.

Content
Google is pretty picky about where the ads are displayed. They don’t want
advertisers complaining to them that their services were being promoted on
a site that supports gambling or is filled with profani ty or contains more ads
than content. If your content doesn’t come up to scratch, you’ll need a site
that does.

Prohibited Clicks
And nastiest of all are the people who either click on their ow n ads or create
programs to do it for them.
The bottom line i s that you don’t need any of this stuff. Maximizing your
revenue within the rules is a breeze!

2.4 As E asy as 1-2-3!

The bottom line is that there are three ways to increase your AdSense
revenue.

1. By Tweaki ng the Ads

to make them more appealing to your visitors;

2. By Opti miz ing your Website

for better AdSense targeting (or w hat the Google folks call 'content
relevance');

And the only sure-fire way to get 1 and 2 right is by

3. Tracki ng Visi tor Response.

If you don't know what works (and what doesn't work) in trying to increase
your AdSense revenue… you're shooting arrows in the dark!

The right tracking tools can reveal a great deal about your visitors and
answer fundamental questions such as what the y're looking for and
what makes them 'click'. Once you've figured that out, bingo! You're on
your way to big AdSense bucks!

But it isn't as straightforward as it seems. If it were, there wouldn't be so
many grumpy people on AdSense forums, complaining about their low
AdSense earnings.

It's not that they aren't doing anything about it. They simply aren't doing the
right things.

Let me assure you that in the time that I have been using AdSense, my
earnings have only gone up — and so will yours, if you apply all my
techni qu es seriously.

1. GETTING STARTED WITH GOOGLE ADSENSE

1.1 The Basics : Buil ding Yo ur Site

Since this book came out lots of people started asking me how they can
make money with AdSense. I’m always happy to help people make the most
of Google, but man y of these people didn’t even have a website!

Here’s the bad news: to make money w ith AdSense, you’ve got to have a
website. There’s no getting around that. The good news though is that it’s
never been easier to create a website from scratch and use it to generate
real revenue.

I’m going to gi ve a brief introduction here to creating a website from the
ground up. You can find plenty more information online and I’ll tell you where
to look. A good place to start is my own book How To Build Profitable
Websites Fast, available at
www.buildawebsitefast.com
.
If you already have a site u p and running, you can just skip this bit, head
down to 1.1 0 and begin reading about how to improve your AdSense
revenues.


1.2 Naming Your Site

The first thing your site will need is a name. That’s easier said than done
these days. All the best words in the dictionary have either already been
bought and built by developers or they’ve been bought and offered by
speculators.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t create a good name and buy it for a song.
Putting two words together w ith a hyphen can work (like
http://w ww.adsense-secrets.com) and there are plenty of good names
available if you’re prepared to move ou tside the world of .coms into .net and
.biz etc.

Your first stop should be www.DomainAnything.com
This is a nuts and bolts
service that lets you hunt and buy names, order hosting plans and even
submit your site to the search engines. When you’re looking for a name, you
can just toss in ten options and the site will tell you which (if any) are
available. Find a good one, and you can either buy it there or pick it up at
www.godaddy.com
(they can be a bit cheaper). All in, buying a name from
one of these service won’t cost you more than about $9 a year.

If you can’t find a name you like and that hasn’t already been grabbed, you
can take a look at sites like www .moderndomain s.com and
www.bestnames.net. These are companies that buy domain names and sell
them for a profit. There’s a good chance you’ll find some good names here
but they can cost you anything from $50 to $50,000. Before you part with a
penny, think about the advantage that a good name can bring and ask
yourself if you can’t get the extra traffic a cheaper way. Often, you can.

1.3 Choo sing A Hosting Service

Your site is going to be stored on a h osting company’s server. (You didn’t
wan t thousands of people dialing into your computer every hour, did you?)
Again, there are lots of different options available depending on how much
you want to pay and what you need.

In general, you’ll want to make sure that you have about 50 megabytes of
space (that’s enough for 100 pages!), full statisti cs reporting and most
importantly, 24 hour service. If your site goes down, you’ll be losing money
every hour it’s offline. If there’s a problem with the server, you want to make
sure it’s fixed ri ght away.

You get what you pay for w ith Web hosting. “Free” services will cost you
more than you save in lost revenu e, and you can pay up to $200 a month for
dedicated servers. Twenty bucks a month is a reasonable price to pay and
GoDaddy.com and NetworkSoluti ons.com both offer good programs.

1.4 Designing T he Site

It used to be said that absolutely anyone could create a website. That was
true: absolutely anyone who knew HTML. Today, you don’t even need to
know that. Programs like Microsoft’s FrontPage or NVU (which is free; you
can download it at www.nvu.com) l et you create sites without you n eeding to
know your tags from your tables. If you can use Word, you can create a
website.
You can either have fun playing with the programs and designing the site
yourself or you can hire a professional designer to do it for you.

Freelance sites like www.elance.com and www.guru.com
are good places to
advertise. You can invite designers to give you quotes and pick the best
based on price and talent. Be sure to check feedback and portfolios though; a
low bid is often low for a good reason.

1.5 Crea ting Content

In Chapter 11, I talk in detail about building content and optimizing what you
write to attract traffic and maximize your AdSense revenues. There are al l
sorts of ways to do th at but for the moment just bear in mi nd that the ads
that appear on your site will depend on the content on your pages. That’s
how AdSense w orks: users click on the ads because they’re relevant.

And that’s why it’s not worth putting up a site just to cash in on particu lar
keywords. Google doesn’t li ke it and neith er do users. If your site doesn’t
genuinely i nterest your vi sitors, you’ll find it hard to get traffic, links and
clicks on your ads.

But there are still a l ot of different ways to create content very easily that
improves your income. I’ll tell you all about them in Chapter 11.

It’s also worth remembering that Google doesn’t place ads on particular
types of sites, so if you’re thinking of building a casino site stuffed w ith
AdSense ads, you can forget about it; it’s not going to happen.

Before you build a site that contains any content that’s remotely (TOS) to make sure
controversial, check out the AdSense Terms of Service that it’s allowed. It will tell whether your idea is sound or whether you need to think again.

1.6 Getti ng Started With Blo gger.co m...
Want to get up and ru nning wi th AdSense really fast? One way is to open an
account at Blogger.com

Blogger is like those old free websites that you could set up in a flash but
which looked like they’d been cobbled together from bits of left-over graphics
that no one else wanted. Except that the blog you create at Blogger.com is
the real McCoy. It’s professional, it looks great… and it takes just seconds to
put together.

All you h ave to do is choose a name and title for your blog, take your pick of
the good range of templates available and get writing.

You don’t have to worry about coding or design work or images or anything
else. If you change your mind about the way your blog looks, you can just
pick a different template. All that’s left for you to do is write… and add
AdSense.

Even that’s been made easy for you.

Blogger.com lets you apply for AdSense directly from its site. It even gives
you a preview of w here your ads will appear and how they will look. While
you’re waitin g for your approval, you can play with fonts and colors so that
you’re all set up and ready to start earning.

Of course, once you’ve done that, there are all sorts of ways to play with the
layout and content. You can easily move the ads into the sidebar by clicking
the Template tab and looking for the line that says:

< !- - Begin #sidebar -- >
< div id="sidebar" >< div id="sidebar2" >

Just paste the AdSense code directly beneath it. But that’s certainl y not all.
In Chapter 11, I explain lots of different, advanced strategies that you can
use to maximize your AdSense earnings on your blog. You should certainly
use them but more important is that you make a start.

With Blogger.com, you can do that in seconds. It’s a great way to get
started, but you should think of it as blogging wi th training w heels. After a
bit you’ll want to move to your own domain so you can really pick up speed.

1.7 ... Or Goo gle’s Pa ge Creator

But blogs aren’t for everyone. Although they’re now one of the easiest ways
to get online, they have to be updated regularly and aren ’t the best option
for static content.

Fortunately Blogger isn’t the only way to get onl ine fast. Google’s Page Creator
makes building a website as simple as poin t, click
and type.

Again, you get a template that you can edit freely, and you can
also break into the H TML to paste the AdSense code. Check to see

how it looks, publish, and all you’ll have to do next i s let people know
where you are.

And that’s where the disadvantages of creating a website using a free tool
like Page Creator kicks in.

With a website created through Page Creator, Search Engine Optimization
becomes difficult. Your URL will be [yourname].googlepages.com, which is
about as catchy a ball of slush. It’s unlikely to get very far in search engines
and when you try to spread it around, it will simply make you look
unprofessional.

Page Creator can be a useful pl ace to get started bu t it’s really designed to
help people like teach ers display information to a closed audience. It’s not a
good way to earn a lot of money.

If you’re keen to get started though, if you have an audience already set
up... or if you just want to see your stuff onl ine fast — and with ads — then
it’s a fun toy to play with.

And you can always move your content onto your own URL when you’re
ready.

1.8 Search Engine O ptimization

However you decide to build your first site, people have to know you ’re
there. One of the most important ways to do that is get yourself a high-
ranking in a search engine.

There are lots of different search engines, but only three are really
important: Google, Yahoo! and MSN. In Chapter 21, I’ll talk i n more detail
about improving your search engine rankings.

If you want to take a shortcut, there are plen ty of companies which will make
the submission s for you and they’ll even optimize your site to get you as high
on the rankings as possible.

1.9 Links

Your search engine rankin g wil l depen d on a number of factors. One of those
factors is the number of si tes that link to yours. As far as Google is
concerned if lots of sites about model rai lways link to your model rai lway
site, that must be a pretty good sign that people who like model railways
think your site is good. So they’ll want to offer it to people who search for
model railways, bringing you lots of free traffic.

Once you’ve got your site up and running you’ll want to persuade other sites
to give you links. You could offer to exchange links and you could even set
up a page that contains recommended links so that you’ll have somewhere to
put them.

There’s a range of other strategies and services that you can use. You can
find out about those in Chapter 2 0.

Introduction

How To Make More Money With Google AdSense

Google wants a slice of your traffic. And they're willing to pay big bucks!

For those who have been complaining of high traffic and low sales, there's
simply no better way to cash in on those hard-earned visitors to your web
pages.

AdSense makes it s o easy!

There's no complicated software to install, no need to scout for affiliates,
nothing to buy and no need to even have a merchant account. So…

Why isn't everybody doing this? More importantly, why isn't everybody
making the most of it?

It's "Hi dden Money"

"Seeing i s believing", they say. M ost w ebmasters love to obsessively track
their visitors, earnings and CTR's several times a day. They love to see
what's there, but they often miss what can be.

AdSense doesn't give you ultimate control over which ads are served, how
the ads are rotated or w hat each click is worth. That's a good thing, because
it's hands-free income. (It does give you some control though, and I’ll tell
you how to use those controls i n this book.)

But many webmasters still think that once you've stuck the AdSense code on
your page, there's little you can do except wait and watch.

Nothing could be further from the truth!

Google gives you a great deal of
control over your ads, and especially their vi sual or graph ic elements. By
tweaking these elements to your advantage, you could easily — in as little as
a few minutes — multiply your click-th roughs many, many times over!

My Experiments with AdSense

I signed up with AdSense in June 2003 , starting small by serving AdSense off
just a few of my pages.
By the end of the day, I'd delivered several thousand AdSense impressions —
which netted me the princely sum of… $3.00. I didn’t exactly burn down the house.

While I didn’t see a great deal of potential based on this initial figu re, I
figured it couldn’t hurt to place AdSense code on more pages. Over the
period of a couple months, I increased my impressions 25-fold, but the clicks
just weren’t happening. That was when I hit my lowest point as an Internet
publisher. My click-through ratios were so bad, I needed thousands of
visitors to net about $30 per day.

At that point, I knew something had to change — and I was going to change
it!

It was as late as April 2004 — ten months after I signed up with AdSense —
that I had my eyes opened to w hat I had been missing al l along. It was one
of the “Ah-Ha!” moments where I felt as though I w as being hit by the
proverbial two-by-four. Immediately, I began experimenting with my Google
ads, testing various placement and colors to see if my assumptions would
hol d water.

The results were fast — and fantastic!

By applying the same easy tweaks discussed in this book, I nearly tripled my
click-through rate, and my income shot up to $600 PER DAY! I still
remember that golden day in April 2004 — and for me th ere' s been no
looking back.

From my early days of being an "AdSense nobody" to becoming a leading
AdSense guru, when a five-figure monthly income no longer surprises me…
it's been an eventfu l journey full of learnin g experiences.

Little cogs run the AdSe nse machinery!

It's easy to get carried away when you're making so much money. But I
never lose sight of the little things that make me big money with AdSense.
Every AdSense partner — however big or small — knows that at the end of
the day, it all boils down to one thing: stats! Your AdSense stats might not
be amazing to start with, but make it a habit to go through it with a fine-
toothed comb. As you start making sense of those 'little numbers'… the big
checks with follow!



Stats are the holy grail of Internet Marketing. This is a real screenshot of my
AdSense stats page taken back in 2004. You can see what I was maki ng d ail y t h e n —
and believe me, I’m making much more now—but specific details such as CPM and
CTR have been blacked out in keeping with Google's terms of service.

Hitting the AdSe nse Jackpot!

As you can see, today AdSense takes care of my car payment, mortgage,
cable bills and a wh ole lot more besides.

Aren't you dying to know…
WHAT was it I did to AdSense — and my website — that turned it overnight
into a cash-cow on steroids?!

More importantly, what can YOU do to sh oot your AdSense income through
the roof- right NOW!

My advice to you is quite simple...

Don't be passive about your AdSense in come; work hard to increase it. But
before you try out that hot new idea you read about at an Internet Forum, be
sure to check out Google's AdSense TOS. Some web publishers have forever
relinquished their fat AdSen se paychecks, just because they were too busy to
pay attention to something so fundamental to their AdSense survival.

I like to play by the rules and have taken adequate care to ensure that my
AdSense tips and tweaks are legit. Making w hat I do from AdSense, I have
little incentive to go on a rule-breaking spree and get my AdSense account
suspended.

For many Internet site owners, AdSense is like the goose that lays the golden
egg. Take good care of your goose — don't slaughter it in the mad rush to
increase your AdSen se income!