Relevant Ads

... how to get them?

[jfodale]

This is a two-part question, I suppose.

One of my sites is in a relatively small niche. Since its creation, it has always received ads that are relevant to my niche's general industry, but never totally spot-on.

I go to Google, do a search for my niche's primary keyword, and there are 8 totally relevant ads on the right that I'm sure would perform fantastically on my site. This leads me to question #1: If there are ads appearing along side a Google search, does that mean those ads could also appear on my site?

If yes, (question #2) how do I get those ads to appear on my site? I've expiremented a lot with section targetting, but it never delivers ads like the ones I see in the search. Should I try to email AdSense? Should I try to block my current advertisers and see what happens?

Thanks in advance.

[Swebbie]

Those ads appearing on Google's site may or may not be from advertisers who are using the content network (Adsense publishers' sites). They might all be limiting their ads to Google's site. I'm not sure there is a way to find out such a thing. I suspect not. You might consider signing up at Yahoo for their system (Yahoo Publisher Network). You might find ads that will be better targeted.

[jfodale]

Thanks for the suggestion. I may try re-applying to YPN. I filled out the application once, 2 months passed, and I received an email saying, "Thank you for your interest, YPN is currently in Beta, we will alert you when it goes public." My guess is that is the rejection email... no idea why I was rejected or why it took 2 months to receive it though.

[ronburk]

there are 8 totally relevant ads on the right that I'm sure would perform fantastically on my site

If that's true, then why don't you already have a relationship with those folks? Is there no opportunity for:

• interviewing them for an article?
  
• asking them questions about their product for an article?
  
• giving them an opportunity for on-the-record comment on a review you're doing of their product or service?
  
• asking them what relevant topics they feel need more coverage on third-party websites?
  
• asking them to be on their press release distribution list?
  
• asking them for a quote to go in a news item you're writing that's relevant to one of their products?
  

If you form a relationship with someone, then they at least know you exist, and you raise the odds your name will come up when they are reviewing their marketing campaign.

And, of course, you would not talk to them about any Google ads or links displayed on your website, since the AdSense TOS has an extremely narrow injunction against that precise topic of conversation.

[jfodale]

Thanks for the tip. Turns out one of the advertisers even has an affiliate program. I think I'll give it a shot.

[danimal]

direct advertising seems like a good idea, until you have to deal with collecting payment, providing reliable stats(setting up an adserver?), and everything else that goes into running a business... maybe signing up only with direct affiliate programs is the best way to handle that?

however, it won't solve your original problem with adsense ads that are missing the mark.

it's possible that your section targeting doesn't include either enuf keywords, or the correct keywords... i have also seen pages that were cluttered with so much frontpage junk that it's a wonder any of the keywords get found.

try locating your keywords near the top of the page with css; as in, the text paragraph gets seen by the bots before the majority of the page does.

[G_Smitty]

What do you consider as Frontpage junk?

[danimal]

are you for real?

google up "frontpage code bloat"