Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Structurally/technically it is the same as all my other pages, with the same layout, same ad blocks, same code except for the page content.
It's talking about a pretty harmless subject, flashlights, and I've got nicely targetted ads on other pages that are similar.
But this page shows only one ad (instead of the 3 adblocks and 1 link unit it should have), and the one that does appear consistently shows 1 of 4 ads that really don't relate well. In fact the menu page right before the problem page has far less content on the subject but shows better targetted ads.
I'm stumped. I've read about the dreaded "stop words" but if that was the problem, why would I get the one adblock? I guess it pretty much HAS to be the content, but I have no idea what is causing this problem.
Thoughts?
I contacted Google, etc. Nothing works! I optimized everything, but no.
You may be subject to the same. I ended up filling the homepage with referrals and search engine box. I will try again soon, though. I think it's the same weird "thing" that is harming your site.
1. There are no appropriate ads to display. Solution: Install and use the Adsense preview tool to see what type ads are available. Also search for your primary terms on Google and see if THEY show any ads related to your keywords.
2. Adsense is confused and doesn't know what kind of ads to put there. This can happen especially if this page is very different in content than the rest of your site. Solution: Read up on and use ad-sense-regions to closely mark your primary terms. You can often remove this later to get more peripheral ads, once Adsense has zeroed in on your terms and realized they have the right general topic.
From your description it sounds like you may have one of these two, since you ARE getting SOME ads as opposed to none or PSAs. How is the CPM on the ads you DO get? Perhaps they've determined this one ad is the ultimate best single ad for that page. We have some pages where this is the case and we only get one ad in one block and make a mint off the page (we've subsequently removed the unused blocks where practical to improve overall CTR). If the page is not very busy, Adsense may simply not have enough info yet to determine that they need to try different ads.
3. If you have eliminated 1 and 2 as the cause, then there is probably a term or combination of terms on the page that is on G's secret list that is triggering a protection filter. It can be something seemingly very innocent like "adult chicken breast filet" or "cruising the Sunset Strip for shows". Solution: In these cases we've contacted Google through the help page with the specific URL and specific examples of the ads you see coming up (or total lack thereof). Within a day or two they usually write back that the problem has been 'fixed' and to please write again if you notice the same problem anywhere else. Apparently it is routine and simply requires a manual inspection of the page by them to make sure it is not violating their policy. If you've done this and they haven't replied in a few days, try again selecting a different contact reason/category from the list on the contact section. I think we usually use 'other' as the topic.
Content-wise, it's very similar to other pages, and talks about a similar subject that gets very well targeted ads on the page immediately preceeding it.
I think that there must be some word or phrase that is causing an issue. I'm going to read through it carefully and see if I can change anything that would help, and will probably report it to get some clues.
Thanks again!
I emailed google and they said the fixed it, but the end result as the same and no good ads showed up.
That indicated that it was my content.
So, with a backup file in hand, I just started taking out my content one paragraph at a time and refreshing, and viola, I found my problem.
I had a sentence, talking about the toughness of these flashlights, that said "These lights are tough, and can take a beating."
Apparently, google somehow ignored all the rest of the content on the page and fixated on the word "beating", assuming that I was talking about something bad.
Stupid.
I rewrote that one sentence and all is well.
So, the lesson here is that if you have a page that doesn't work, report it to google but look at your words like a super sensitive-prudish-politically corect-christian-grandma and take out anything that could even REMOTELY be offensive.
