Would fewer units per page equal more targeted ads?

[vero]

I was just wondering, if anyone using all 3 ad units allowed per page, ever switched to a lower number - two or even just one - and found that the ads were better targeted?

On my site, some ads in each unit are right on, but others - not so much. I was wondering if I used fewer units per page if it would help that.

Thanks.

[wyweb]

I've found that it actually does help with ad relevance. eCPM goes up as well.

Your milage may certainly vary but I've found that 2 ad blocks are better than 3.

[ecmedia]

Yes, if you place ads closer to content you will get more targeted ads. If you have close to menu or links it is common to see ads irrelevant to main content.

[farmboy]

I was just wondering, if anyone using all 3 ad units allowed per page, ever switched to a lower number - two or even just one - and found that the ads were better targeted?

I suppose it depends on the page topic and the available ad inventory. I have pages where there seems to be an unlimited supply of targeted ads and others where the supply seems to be lean.

Another thing to consider is there may be something about your content, layout, etc. that is causing you to see ads that are not targeted to your liking.

FarmBoy

[purplecape]

Look up "section targeting" in AdSense Help--this will allow you to exclude portions of a page from being indexed by the AdSense bot, and may help targeting.

[denisl]

I'm sure I have read in the Google literature that where there are several add units on a page, google will put the most relevant adds in the first unit that appears in your code and the last unit will have the least relevant adds (I guess sectional targeting changes that).

[purplecape]

denisl, what Google says is not that they put the ads in order of relevance, but in order of overall payout, taking into account both CTR and CPC (supposedly). Less relevant ads may pay worse, of course, but the algo. is set up to find the relevant ads for the page and then rank them by payout...

[Atomic]

I can't say for sure that removing ad units improves ad targeting but I can say that my site looks a lot less like a flea market and that traffic's improved over time since removing ad units. That's meant higher overall income.

[spaceylacie]

Yes, have done that and it worked better than 3 ad units. I went down to one per page on most pages, but not all.

[shyspinner]

I've reduced mine from three to two ads and it has improved the contextual side of things and the CTR. On very targeted pages I have three, but it's just an experiment at this point because the third is image only, but always targetted well.

[ken_b]

As a kind of reverse to this I took out a single 250x250 and replaced iot with 3 - 234x60 blocks and saw an increase in income.

Why is beyond me, but the 250x250 would often show a single ad (it can show up to 3 ads), but the all of the 234x60 blocks would show ads.

Seems odd to me. You'd think that if 3 ads were available most of the time they'd show in a 250x250 just as well as in 3 separate 234x60 blocks.

[cgiscripts4u]

I did have 3 text ad units on every page of my site, I changed this a while back to 1 300x250 unit above the fold and a 468x15 link unit at the bottom of the page and have not looked back.