Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Our previous ASA is transitioning to a new role within Google, so I'm thrilled to announce that I'll be your new ASA.
I really look forward to working with you.
Fire away!
ASA
I bet they see ASA as a hygiene factor of some sorts. Makes a good impression on new members to both Adsense ("Ah! Here is a person that will help me.") and/or Webmasterworld ("Ah! Webmasterworld is a cool place to be! They even have real persons contributing who work for Google.").
But the value of the information that was communicated down to us from Google has been, well, close to zero so far.
Maybe something like 1-800-AdSense ?
Start off with an automated section, then if your question is still not answered, press '0' and you'll be able to speak with a live ASA.
...you've been here for 3 years and 11 days, correct me if I'm wrong...
I don't understand the point of your question.
...just please don't break our brand new ASA with unreasonable expectations.
Don't worry about that. I've concluded the only expectation that is reasonable about the ASA is to not have any expectations.
FarmBoy
I expect the same is true of ASA. He/She is not here to bring us enlightenment, but to take our issues and problems back to Google. And maybe explain a policy or something when there's a very general question.
It would be totally unreasonable to expect anything more from Google in either of the WebmasterWorld forums.
Think about it. It's the same sort of issue that Matt Cutts has - every slightest thing he says, down to the placement of his punctuation gets spread around to hundreds of thousands of people, analyzed and re-analyzed over and over again, subject to multiple interpretations, no matter how generic. The scammers land on it like a duck on a june bug trying to figure out how to exploit it. The person who uttered it would probably have to spend a lifetime explaining it again and again. No single person should have (or want) that kind of responsibility, and if they DID have it, they wouldn't be posting it here among a very small base of publishers.
AdWords has it good and probably should too for our sake, but it's so dry and down to fire containment at this side of the fence.
netmeg: please tell me, what's the difference between contacting Adsense Support with issues, and listening to ASA saying "Fire away" in this forum? Not a lot, in my experience from the past few years.
If you came here expecting to see immediate action on your particular issues, you're going to be disappointed. Everything the AdSense people say or do most likely has to be vetted and re-vetted and tested and picked at - it affects a LOT of things and a LOT of people. Everything they do to AdWords affects AdSense, and everything they do to AdSense affects AdWords, and now there's Analytics to also bring into the mix.
Now add in the tens of thousands - maybe hundreds of thousands - of people on both the advertiser and publisher sides who will do anything they can think of to scam the system. They don't care about you or me, they don't care about Google, and they don't care about any long term strategies or if they get tossed out in a week, because they will have made their money.
It's not as simple as it might seem.
martinibuster and rj87uk, I'm happy to post a link to the blog or the text of major blog posts here if you'd like so that we can discuss, but rewriting every announcement we make there is time better spent doing other things, IMHO.
signor_john, You're right that we'd like every publisher to read the blog, but that's partly an issue of efficiency. We love that people are discussing AdSense in all kinds of blogs and forums, but we can't really make each announcement on every website where people are discussing AdSense.
martinibuster, AdSense wasn't at PubCon this year, but I hear Matt was great.
night707 and ArtistMike, I 100% guarantee that there are no earnings caps on AdSense accounts. I will swear it on a big stack of Google search results. No earnings caps.
farmboy and StoutFiles, I'm going to bring this up with AdWords Advisor the next time we meet, since the issue seems pretty tied to AdWords. We're one big ads ecosystem, and we all want to keep things running smoothly.
fredw, I'm glad you're glad. There are plenty of things I'm not going to be able to tell you. I assume you'd rather I say "I can't answer that," than ignore it.
Hobbs and Lagonda, I agree. ASA needs a break. :)
ArtistMike, it definitely is in our best interest to make you more money. When we give you tips, it's because we've found that these things increase earnings for most people. That doesn't mean every tip will work for every site, but we have zero incentive to give you guys advice that we don't think will increase your ads' performance and advertiser ROI in the content network.
kaustubh, we retired referrals a few months ago. See [google.com...] for details.
night707, do you really feel that way about Google? I promise you, that's not what the people at AdSense or at Google think.
farmboy, Hobbs, and zett, it seems like having a new ASA isn't making a good impression so far. Honestly, the reason that I'm here is because the publishers here are a smart group of people who know what they want from us. Our goal is to hear that and try to deliver it when possible. Keep in mind that AdSense's incentives are pretty well aligned with our publishers' and our advertisers', so we want you to succeed as much as you do.
greatstart, what you're suggesting means you'd be heard by one person. Isn't it better to find ways to share feedback with a group of people (including ASA) who can help identify the most common and most pressing concerns?
netmeg, you hit the nail on the head. I'm here to find out what you guys want, aggregate it, prioritize it, and bring it to the many people at Google who want to hear your feedback. And frankly, it wouldn't hurt to dispel some of the misconceptions I see along the way.
ASA
it seems like having a new ASA isn't making a good impression
I disagree, just keep doing what you just did now and you'll have them purring in no time.
It seems some are bent on dragging their past misery along to you...whatever...they can wallow in it. No matter what you do, some people may never be satisfied, just ignore it and keep an open mind to those with constructive input.
Now that you clarified what your role is here, we can understand what to expect as far as information. It's a group effort at improving Adsense, not a personal resolution center for everyones Adsense accounts. For up to date information...we go directly to the blog :)
Cheers
night707 and ArtistMike, I 100% guarantee that there are no earnings caps on AdSense accounts. I will swear it on a big stack of Google search results. No earnings caps.
I'm repeating it here because it deserves to be emphasized. It's great to have what I believed to be true confirmed officially.
Can I please set the minimum bid for the channel or the ad block? Why can't I set the minimum bid for my channel or ad block? Why can't I set the minimum bid that I will accept for a web site? Is it not my right to set the value for my property if I wish to sell access to that property to advertisers? Why do I not have that ability when working with Google?
[edited by: ArtistMike at 9:41 pm (utc) on Nov. 17, 2008]
If you're running other ads (e.g. ads you sell directly), you should be using Ad Manager, which lets you set the minimum eCPM for AdSense ads to compete with remnant and house ads.
For details on that feature of Ad Manager, check out this article [google.com] or this article [google.com] in the Ad Manager help center.
ASA
can I ask why you'd want to set a minimum CPC/CPM for a channel or an ad block?
Shocked...I'm shocked! Do you really need to ask this question?
Why are you not aware of my rights as a site owner that ALLOWS your company to rent space on my site? Why do you have to ask why I want my rights?
That has been our experience. We have read that here too.
We had removed our link units, but few days ago we tried to give it a shot. So far not impressive.
Link units are great complement, but they pay very little.
In fact we have been thinking that there should not be a difference between Search network ads and Link unit ads.
For example, some publishers opt out from content network, and that has caused our revenues to shrink.
However, if the advertsier wants to opt out from content network what is the rationale of opting him/her out from the link units as well?
For example, if I am in google and searching for GadgetX is this not the same if I am inside a website, clicking on a link unit that reads GadgetX?
My point is that when the advertiser opts out of the content network there is no rationale or need to opt him/her out from the link units (despite link units being in the content network).
Would you please give this some thought?
This may also help to bring all the advertisers to websites, and help them to get more trafficl.
Conclusion: If the visitor is clicking on a link unit link that reads gadgetX and seeing GadgetX search like results (although sponsered) it's 95 percent the same as if he or she is searching gadgetX in Google.
Thank you for your reply ASA.
Why are you not aware of my rights as a site owner that ALLOWS your company to rent space on my site? Why do you have to ask why I want my rights
ArtistMike, your rights--and Google's--are spelled out in the AdSense Terms & Conditions and Program Policies. ASA has a tough enough job without getting beaten up by publishers who confuse wishes with rights.
Why are you not aware of my rights as a site owner that ALLOWS your company to rent space on my site? Why do you have to ask why I want my rights?
they are more than aware of your rights as a site owner to set minimum bids on your own site, and they honor that right. They placed a minimum bid of $0.00 per click, and you accepted that bid by placing their ads on your site. But thankfully, AdSense doesn't limit themselves to their minimum bid.
It's fine to ask for more control, but don't make unfounded accusations. You might also want to read up on any of the reasonable explanation on why it is not in google's or the general publisher populations best interest to allow that setting, at least not the way that most publishers picture it.
Why are you not aware of my rights as a site owner that ALLOWS your company to rent space on my site? Why do you have to ask why I want my rights?
And one more - AdSense is set it and forget it. You don't have to do any work as far as finding advertising (i.e. you get what you pay for). If you want that kind of control, then you have to do the work for it - go out and sell advertising on your site to the advertisers you want at the prices you want.
As for link units - they're pretty profitable for me, I have sites where I don't have anything else BUT link units (no room)
If an advertiser opts out of Content, that means he wants his ads to show up on Google search pages only. The Link unit page does NOT count as a Google search page to me (as an advertiser)
i think you might be conflating two things. some people call display ads "cpm ads"... but the revenue of even cpc ads can be reduced to a cpm (as they do in google reports).
my understanding of admanager is that you can use it to set a minimum cpm even for cpc ads. you basically just set the minimum cpm you want to earn, and if adsense cant deliver it, then your house ad runs. if you dont want a house ad, then the space should just collapse.
I think there is some confusion surrounding text vs. image ads, CPM vs. CPC ads, and placement-targeted vs. contextually targeted ads. It’s best to think of these as separate questions, but everyone wants to know how they relate, so here goes:
For each ad slot, you decide whether to enable text ads, image ads, or both. Enabling text or image ads in a slot has nothing to do with how the ads are targeted or on what basis they’re paid.
CPM ads are always placement-targeted. CPC ads can either be placement-targeted or contextually targeted. Any of these combinations can be text ads or image ads. The only thing you won't see is a contextually targeted CPM ad.
elsewhen, you're right about how CPC ads and CPM ads can be compared to each other through the concept of eCPM [google.com].
ArtistMike, anyone with an approved AdSense account can sign up for Ad Manager.
HuskyPup and ArtistMike, I wasn’t trying to be antagonistic. I’m just trying to understand the reason behind the request. If the reason for setting a minimum is that you’ve seen a correlation between low-paying ads and low-quality ads, that’s one thing. If the reason is that it’s not worth it to you to show ads at all on your site unless they pay a certain amount, that’s another. I’m happy to pass along any feature request you have, but people are going to ask me why you want it. I just need to know what to tell them.
ASA
