Re: Full Online Ads List Archive now online

From: Janet Attard <attard_at_businessknowhow.com>
Date: Fri 12 Jan 2007 11:13:22 -0600

I rarely post here, but based on our experience on BusinessKnowHow.com, I
have some different thoughts about contextual advertising than Adam. Now,
some of my audience is different than this list. We have a lot of
traditional businesses - retailers, landscapers, consultants, and similar
small and self-employed businesses. So expectations of our readers and what
we see working or not working may differ from this list. But here's what I
see

Readers pretty much will read the content they want and not be bothered by
ads.

> Adsense tends to display the highest paying ads first, so
> creating smaller ad blocks definitely helps hit the best
> click pricing for publishers.

They do display the highest click ads first, but from what I see happening
on our own pages, they often change the number of ads displayed in the box.
So, sometimes there's only one ad in a box that will hold four. I can only
presume that's because the one advertiser has better CTR and/or is paying
more than the next couple down. Google, I presume, would optimize this stuff
to make more themselves, too. When the one ad is an image ad or video, it
looks great (we usually have our site set to allow both text and image ads).
When it's one short text ad in a big text box, there's too much white space
for my taste - but it brings in revenue. And we don't get complaints from
our site visitors, which is the critical thing.

> If it were my own site I'd remove the contextuals except for
> a small spot at the bottom. Focus on getting advertisers
> instead - you should be getting decent traffic from those
> rankings.

Having contextual ads on our pages hasn't stopped us from also getting
advertisers. Some have continued campaigns over periods of several months -
or more - others didn't. But that was true before we ever ran AdSense ads,
too. Some ads just do well, others don't - either because the markets aren't
a good fit, the creative stinks, the landing page stinks, or the ad has been
seen so many times on so many sites that people no longer even notice it.

> with adsense below the main links. Then add a classy
> greyed-out "sponsors" tag to differentiate the ad blocks from
> your main nav links.

If you're using Adsense, the key, we've found to success, is to experiment.
We try different placements, colors, etc., watch the results and then change
and watch some more. Whatever works best for us stays. What doesn't gets
changed.

What's important though, is what works best on each site may vary slightly.
We've tried some things some of publisher friends of mine have said work
great for them, and they don't work well for us. And just as likely some
things we do wouldn't work for others.

Bottom line: test and look at stats - including whether the number of site
visitors goes up or down.

--Janet Attard
Small Business / Home Business Resources http://www.businessknowhow.com
http://www.franchisetrade.com
Blog: http://www.blog.businessknowhow.com
Free newsletter: http://www.businessknowhow.com/newsletter/subscribe.htm

 




Received on Fri Jan 12 2007 - 11:13:22 CST