New "Show more" link to reload ads

keyword link loads new ad in iframe

[moTi]

there was a thread a few days ago when someone noticed a "show more" link in his ad block. this link lead to a result page with google ads (like when clicking on a google link unit).

but i notice there is another new ad type with several keyword links at the bottom. it looks like a link unit, but if you click on one of these keywords, another set of ads, relevant to the keyword is loaded into the ad frame. so if the user wants, he could keep on clicking his way through different sets of ads now until he reaches an ad block without the keywords at the bottom. that without causing additional page impressions on your server. your webpage stays the same, only the ads inside the ad block change.

in terms of user experience i think the "show more" is rather bad, because all it does is directing the user to a page full of ads. so i'd prefer to not have it in the ad blocks. but the keyword links are rather nice..

[edited by: moTi at 8:24 pm (utc) on Aug. 17, 2007]

[chocorol]

That's quite interesting. I saw one of those new ads in my site but I didn't click it, fearing it would count as a click. However I really want to see how do they work so , when I see one of these ads in another site, I'll try 'em.

I don't like the 'Show more ads' message I've got in some blocks either, if I don't use adlinks is because I don't want my users to go to a page full of only ads.

[moTi]

i think as long as you only click the keyword links it counts as ad impressions, not as clicks.

this should have the following interesting effects on adsense stats:

this feature triggers additional ad impressions:
- number of ad impressions: up

visitors may now find better ads that suit their needs:
- number of clicks: up

and as long as smart-pricing doesn't kick in (why should it, more people who click look closely):
- earnings: up

haha and now the catch question: ctr?
people who cause the number of ad impressions to go up are the ones who are highly interested in the ads and therefore more likely to click than your average ctr indicates. hence likely:
- ctr: up!

however, the effects should be marginal, since most of all visitors are presumably interested in your content ;)

[Khensu]

I have it and I think it's good. Infact I was trying to do just that about 6 months ago but though it was to risky to develop.

Now if they would just let me choose the keywords and results that appear in link units, that would rock.

[kappaknight]

You could pick your words if you're a large enough content partner.

[Khensu]

Large revenue or large amount of pages?

[Marcia]

So they're SEOing the adverts with keywords without disclosing to publishers that the ad format has changed. A major change like this should be documented in the interface; lack of disclosure makes it bait and switch. Presenting publishers with one thing and giving them another is on a par with delivering one web page to Googlebot and delivering another page to users.

In-house SEO spam coming right out of Mountain View hqs. Nice. Very nice.

[edited by: Marcia at 6:17 pm (utc) on Aug. 18, 2007]

[moTi]

hmm.. [webmasterworld.com...]

one could argue, that we are some kind of guinea pigs for google. but at least it's their advertising space provided by the publisher..
as said, some of their experiments i don't like either. it's disputable, if an "opt-out" of new features is advisable. i remember some time ago they experimented with a search box in their regular ads. didn't last long though.