venti - 2:31 am on Mar 8, 2011 (gmt 0)

Has anyone else noticed the trend that sites which rank well now seem to have their ad blocks outside the primary content area (e.g. headers, sidebars, footer, etc..)? It is not 100% of the time, however it does seem to be a trend. We were hit with a 35% decrease in traffic and have been working night and day fix things (e.g. removing pages, tweaking overall UI, changing the above the fold UI, taking suggestions for anyone who cares to voice them, etc...).We did have small ads appear inline with the content previously. It wasn't done in a misleading manner, I just hate the look of huge banners and ad blocks running across the site. I am grasping at straws as to what else to change. We gone so far as to sacrifice earnings by 65% to make things right and nothing... Assuming the changes are good for our end users, we are happy to change anything. Just wish we could find just what that is...

We would rather reach/help more end users than make a buck. On the whole, the algorithm does seem to be an improvement but it is far from 100% in some circumstances.