336x250 only showing two ads?

[maxgoldie]

For the first time I see only two ads in my 336x250, where there normally should be four. Plus the fonts are almost twice as big as normal.

It looks terrible. Any ideas how to get it to show four ads?

(I have opted out of CPM and "advertise on this site".)

[maxgoldie]

I wish they would stop engineering us lower CTRs :)

[21_blue]

A puzzling aspect of this change is that not only is CTR very low, but EPC is very low on the pages where these ads appear (on our pages, anyway). I can't see Google making money from this on our site, there may be a bug somewhere in the Adsense algorithm.

[NoLimits]

I wish they would stop engineering us lower CTRs :)

+ 1

I am so thankful that other programs have launched recently. I don't know what I would do if AdSense was my only option... especially when things like this keep popping up. It's like a constant uphill battle.

[jomaxx]

I'd really think it would be appropriate for ASA to comment, explaining what's going on and whether this is a permanent change.

[annej]

Yes, If it's permanent I'll take on the big job of changing them all. But first I want to see if it's temporary. Rectangle ads have worked really well for me up till now.

So ASA can you tell us?

[maxgoldie]

Rectangle ads have worked really well for me up till now.

That is a good point -- if even Google admits that the large rectangle is, overall, one of the better performers -- why would they change it, en masse?

[catch2948]

Could be that G is trying to turn the screws on many of the spam sites in doing this ... As the 336x280 format is one of the best converting formats that Adsense has, it shows quite frequently in spam and scraper sites. Who knows ... Maybe this is a prelude to something bigger in attempting to deal with spammers ...

[sailorjwd]

Now I'm getting one fat ad in a 336 rectangle. Yesterday there were two ads.

[adamxcl]

I dislike the two ads in the rectangle but have to admit that me CPM has gone way up. CTR is down just a little bit but the earnings are now higher overall. Weird since I expect the downturn others are saying.

It's probably the layout impacting it as well because the two ads and white space actually okay in many sections of my layout. That's probably holding it up, plus possibly the two highest paying ads being shown most of the time?

[CainIV]

eCPM is down for me by about 50%+ and CTR has not improved on the same site...only two ads showing inthe large rectangle on any given page

On another site, 4 ads are still being shown in the Large rectangle, and full ads in the skyscraper.

What gives?