Encouraging visitors to search

[farmboy]

I visited a very popular political blog today and on the right side of the page was a 120 x 600 Adsense display. One ad consumed the entire space and the consisted of just four words (no graphics) as follows:

example.com

example example

example.com

I'm using "example" instead of the actual word that appeared there in case anyone is wondering.

The ad lead to the site "example.com" and the site seemed to actually offer "example" services. It had a Google page rank of 6.

Right in the middle of the page was the following text:

Let our partnership with Google help you find what you're looking for!

Enter the example information you're looking for and press Search.

and that was just above a Google search box.

Is that an overly aggressive method of encouraging searches?

FarmBoy

[Swanny007]

[webmasterworld.com...]

[Hobbs]

That thread was not conclusive.
Is AdSenseAdvisor still here?

[farmboy]

I went to an internal page on the site and the encouragement to search is even more evident with a list of suggested search terms.

FarmBoy

[swa66]

Just suggest them for a manual review to the google team. It's not our call to decide good vs. bad. But we can help the program we're benefiting from by keeping the others honest.

[farmboy]

It's not our call to decide good vs. bad. But we can help the program we're benefiting from by keeping the others honest.

Isn't deciding they need to be kept honest the same as deciding they are bad?

That aside, I'm not concerned with whether this particular AdSense publisher is bad or good. I'd just like some official clarification from Google as to what is allowed.

FarmBoy

[swa66]

There's a difference between trying to get the line of where good ends and where bad starts, and to report to Google -for their judgment- on those you feel are the more shady ones that hurt the program in your opinion.

If you hope to get a clear well defined line: it's my opinion Google is not so likely to give it to you all that fast. Nor should they. The gray area they intentionally leave allows them to take a look at the whole and judge on that if this publishers is a good thing in the program yes or no. That's what's going to keep advertisers.
Should they give a clear definition of all lines, I'm sure we'll see people walking in the lines, but right on the edge of every line, what in total would be a bad thing. Just look at e.g. traffic rules: there is always room for interpretation by the officers to look at the overall picture and e.g. slap you with recklessness, even if you stayed within the speed limit.