Releasing Advertisers from Competive Ad Filter

Just to see what happens

[Sweet Cognac]

Since the ads and Adwords is so messed up now, I think I'll just release the blocked advertisers (about 20) from the Competive Ad Filter. Most of them are those superstores and auction houses, that are all over the serps now.

Still better to show some of these than PSAs, and who knows, that big auction house might be bidding $2.00 a click now.

I copied and pasted the list in Notepad first, just in case I need to add them back at a later date.

[leadegroot]

Backing it up is a good idea.
You put effort into figuring out who to block and you want to avoid redoing it later.
Never hurts to remove the blocks occasionally - no way of telling if they have changed otherwise.

[Celicaphile]

I might consider that if my list didn't consist of competitors who don't like to play nice, my own sites, and sites that promote spyware/parasiteware or have drive by installs...

[Alioc]

I always allow fair competitors. I just don't like to show ads about gambling, gay s**t and misleading religious sites and similar garbage.

[Sweet Cognac]

Some of the ones I blocked just were bad targeting, or unrelated, but who's to say whether or not visitors would be interested in off target ads?

But really, if you have a page about the Industrial Revolution, who's going to click on an ad that says, "Get your industrial toliets here!"

Geesh... I'll give them this week, till all this settles down, then reblock if necessary.

[david_uk]

I've been experimenting with the competitive filter for a while now, and have found that blocking irrelevant ads is going a bit too far. I unblocked the irrelevant ones, and my earnings did peak at optimum and that's the state I'm currently in. It's always an idea to look at the list regularly, as deleting sites off of it that are no longer a problem keeps the list manageable.

What works best for me is blocking Ebay affilliates, scrapers and any site that is clearly made for adsense. Although blocking sites works very well for me, I'd certainly say that it doesn't work for everybody and I'd use the feature with caution.

[Sweet Cognac]

In the Adwords forum, advertisers are saying that keywords that are broadmatched are paying lower, and keywords that are specific are paying higher.

Does broadmatched mean a "general" or "generic" keyword? Like hotel would be a general term, or cell phone. But they would pay higher if it was a specific Hotel or cell phone?

These general keywords seem to be where my one cent clicks are coming from. What if I block these 1 cent advertisers?

[YesMom]

Sweet --

Try to optimize for the phrases that are more specific.

Those advertisers who you'd block for lower paying general keywords are the same advertisers (in my case anyway!) who also bid higher on the more specific terms.

I recently (mistakenly) removed a single phrase that was near an AdSense ad block. The same advertisers were showing, but the EPC dropped like a lead balloon. I put the specific phrase back in place and everything went back to normal!

Figuring out what the keyword phrase IS is the real challenge. ;-)

[YesMom]

Just wanted to add that I would assume a good example would be like this:

general keyword: hotel
higher-paying: "hotel in Madrid" or "Madrid hotels"

Not a specific hotel, but what the advertiser would expect a high-converting customer to have typed in for searching them out.

Remember, the advertiser is trying to optimize for the search engine users first and not the content network.

[Sweet Cognac]

Thanks YesMom, those are words of wisdom. I really didn't consider that, that the advertisers are optimizing for the serps.

Hmmm... I guess I need to start thinking like an advertiser instead of a publisher?

[Alioc]

I guess I need to start thinking like an advertiser instead of a publisher?

A good mix and balance of both of the worlds = Veni Vidi Vici :)