I lied.

There’s just no way you can think of every single way to correctly position and place Adsense on your blog in order to get the maximum benefit from it. And that is the beauty of ads, placement, and even blogging in general; the idea of having so many numerous combination’s of the same basic techniques and methods and still have great results. So here we are ready to learn as much about Adsense as we possibly can in one post.

Following the Rules

First of all, it is important to adhere to all of Google Adsense Terms and Conditions as well as Program Policies which every Adsense publisher has agreed to and read when they signed up for Google Adsense. So, long story short, I won’t be going over those, however all tips n’ tricks here will be compliant with the policies I have linked to above.

Ad Color and Blending

For our first tip, is a basic one is to create ad blocks that blend with your usual text. This means to have the same background color as your web page and make your Adsense links blend with your posts. As I have discussed earlier in my post, Using Heatmaps to Effectively Position Ads, make sure your ads match up in color where you think your ads will result in the most clicks based off of heatmap data. Ad Titles should be in whatever colors your standard links are, preferably blue or purple. When users see blue or purple, they automatically associate it with links and are already pre-opted to click.

Ad Size

In your list of choices for ad block size in your Adsense Dashboard, you have many different choices for sizes. Stay away from 468×60 ads because those are so numerous and so generic that 99% of your readers know that they’re ads. When a person sees a 468×60 ad block, their brain associates it with an ad, and ads mean don’t click. However, when a user looks at something like a 336×280 they see the ad links, not the ad box.

Images

Images are great, they work very well as I described in the Styling your Posts the Correct Way post, but they do not work well with Adsense. Image ads are another way of telling readers that this is a banner, so don’t click. For me in particular, when I write this post, image ads remind me of those “Win a Free PS3!!” banners, and like the majority of the people, I doubt you’ll click. For our purposes, refrain from using image ads because they are not nearly as effective as text ads.

Adsense Decoration

If your blog is design heavy, meaning you have a lot of style and decoration, you may consider designing your ad give it more disguise. Readers these days have become blind to ads which is why it is important to make our ads stand out. But this does not mean making it stand out by adding a different background color. This means, adding design. Here is an example:

Limits

Remember that Google Adsense only allows you to place up to three ad units and two link units on one page. You do not have to max out on these units, sometimes only 2-3 is enough. Sometimes only one ad unit may be the best choice. The goal is to provide readers with content and depending on your content size you should place ads so that they’re not overwhelming, but still noticeable.

Final Note

I keep stressing my Using Heatmaps to Effectively Position Ads post for a reason. It is vitally important to run a heatmap to see where your users click. Otherwise your advertising efforts are something along the lines of “worthless”.

Further Reading:

• This is One Post You’ll Love - Guaranteed!
• Using Heatmaps to Effectively Position Ads
• Not All Traffic is Created Equal
• Make Your Blog Busy By Busying it With Plugins