Forum Moderators: martinibuster
How many of you use a rotating (re: the four color scheme that Google allows) for your banners, and how many use a single color scheme, and why?
On my site, the rotating background colors (3) and contrasting borders work best.
Trying to blend the ads with my site colors had a very negaive on performance.
But ad size and location are at least as important. Again, that has to keyed to what works on your site.
I do like the rotating colors because they send a subliminal message that says, "Hey, the pastel blue ad block on this page isn't the same as the yellow ad block that you saw on the previous page." In theory, at least, readers are more likely to notice the ads when the ads aren't static in appearance.
I do like the rotating colors because they send a subliminal message that says, "Hey, the pastel blue ad block on this page isn't the same as the yellow ad block that you saw on the previous page." In theory, at least, readers are more likely to notice the ads when the ads aren't static in appearance.
well said... I'm encouraged to try it now.
The advantage is that I can give each color its own tracking ID, and figure out white colors work and which don't.
The disadvantage is that a given page is always the same color. If a particular page is very popular it can throw off the tracking calculations.
I started using the rotating colors about a week or 10 days ago, and CTR is slightly higher than it was before. It would be hard to prove that the color change was the reason for the modest increase, though.
I tried it on selected pages about when you did and at first I noticed a big improvement. Then my stats for the last week didn't look as good on my main pages. Then it dawned on me that I have a link to places people can give to tsunami relief at the top of those columns so of course fewer people are clicking ads. So many little things like that make a difference so it's hard to test. I'm going to leave it on the pages I put it on. They are all header pages for topic sections. I think with a site my size I have to test things over a longer period of time.
Rectangles embedded in my articles seems to be best right now for article pages.
try making the ad descriptor/url a lighter color than the standard black. It helps the link/header text stand out and makes the ad look less cluttered.
Great idea. I'm off to take a look at my color schemes for ads again.
The first day I used the standard mother earth. I got 2.3% CTR.
The second day I used bright red color. 4.4%
The third day I changed my content around to match the adsense font etc... I also made the adsense match my background colors etc...
I got 8.9% CTR the third day and made about 8 times more money than the first day!
8 times more money is a huge amount and I plan on doing this to all of my sites.
The third day I changed my content around to match the adsense font etc... I also made the adsense match my background colors etc...
I got 8.9% CTR the third day and made about 8 times more money than the first day!
8 times more money is a huge amount and I plan on doing this to all of my sites.
That sounds like a good argument for letting advertisers have the same kind of exclude filters that publishers have. Advertisers don't want to pay for referrals that occur because users can't tell the difference between an internal link and an ad.
In theory, at least, readers are more likely to notice the ads when the ads aren't static in appearance.
europeforvisitors, I saw in another thread your site was mentioned. I went there to see how you have your AdSense laid out but didn't see it on the first page. When I clicked on an internal link and the AdSense color changed I immediately saw the ads.
I just thought I'd throw that out as an endorsement for the point that was made.
That sounds like a good argument for letting advertisers have the same kind of exclude filters that publishers have.
Are you an advertiser?
Are you an advertiser?
Nope, but I've worked for or with enough multinational advertising agencies, direct-marketing firms, and Fortune 500 corporations to know how they feel about worthless leads and shady media.
As for information sites I am not sure but I do know that an ad get's more clicks when it sticks out like a sore thumb. Of course if it looks like a banner people don't like to click on banners anymore.
I used google's banners and sky scrapers and the CTR was super low like under 1%. even when I added it into the content.
The best format I have found is the large rectangle with 4 ads in it. then make the border match your background and the ctr goes up.
Nope, but I've worked for or with enough multinational advertising agencies, direct-marketing firms, and Fortune 500 corporations to know how they feel about worthless leads and shady media.
Have you writtent to Google about your concerns over their allowed color schemes? Don't you think Google knows that some color schemes cause ads to appear more like page content than ads? Do you tell your visitors that the links in your content are affiliate links?
Is there anyone here who honestly believes that helping users to mistake AdSense ads for editorial or navigation links is good for advertisers?
In one section/series, when I put ads up in the "matches the scheme" fashion, they pull only *1/4* of what they pull in another section with the same color scheme. And the layout is exactly the same.
Simply put, it seems that in the lower pulling section, more viewers are there to read the information, whereas people are in more of a "search" or "buying" mode when they land on in the higher pulling section.
And yes, I've tested out putting ads on the *bottom* of the section that pulls lower. But I still haven't got anywhere near the conversion rate of the first section.
Also, I should add that CPM's in this higher-converting section have been the same (and quite high) before and after SmartPricing. So they must be bringing in good leads for the advertisers.
I would think if you do the change to that scheme, and your conversions go up but your CPM's drop thanks to SmartPricing, then you ARE "tricking people" into clicks. In which case you should stop immediately, for your sake and the advertisers!
Anyway, if you're bringing in people who aren't in a buying mode, it doesn't matter *how* or *where* you put the ads, they just won't click.
But there are so many other factors. People are less likely to click on a page of contents or a directory on the topic. Click are more frequent after they get to the article and either read it then click or decide it's not what they were looking for then move on by clicking on an ad.
Also it makes a huge difference whether the ads are what your visitors are interested in. My visitors are interested in supplies for a hobby not buying the finished product. So supply ads do so much better.
helping users to mistake AdSense ads for editorial or navigation links
he's stating the obvious, at least to some of us. He obviously cares about the quality of his content. You can tell by examining his site. Likewise, there are AdSense publishers for whom concerns about "quality of content" is hard to derive from examining their websites, beyond concluding that their guiding principal is that "the content cough, choke, gag gets indexed by search engines and people click on AdSense, that's good".
A consident thread throughout EFV's posts is a concern that Google can doing itself - and its 'publishers' - harm if it doesn't restrict or realign AdSense in some way such that quality of content can be employed by advertisers as a selection criteria when they sign-on to AdSense.
[edited by: Webwork at 11:48 pm (utc) on Jan. 11, 2005]
On the other hand, if could just be a ploy. If EFV's site ever gets shut down for fraud, half the people here will write letters in his support. Very clever. :)
There's a thin line between reducing box-blindnes through color integration and tricking people into clicking on your ads. I think Google should, however, crack down on the most eggregious examples.
Technical suggestion for Google, to improve on "conversion" numbers: Put a little JS in your ad that loads a small graphic every few seconds. Together with the server data, this should allow you to tell when someone clicks on an add and then quickly uses the back button. A high back-button percentage means people aren't really interested in the ads, and perhaps didn't even understand they were an ad.
Google can have that idea for free. But won't you consider hiring me? :)
