AdSense should let you know if you've been smartpriced

[avalon37]

Anyone else agree that AdSense should be more transparent as to where you stand as a publisher? Lately, I can't tell if one of my sites has been smartpriced or it's just Google's horrible ad targeting. So frustrating. I'm hoping it's the deteriorating ad relevancy, but then again that's just as bad (or worse) than being smartpriced.

[netmeg]

I don't see them doing that.

However, I don't see why they couldn't do something in their Scorecard along lines of:

You could potentially improve your earnings by working on your:

- traffic quality
- content quality
- user experience

Or something like that. At least give people a hint.

[martinibuster]

I was thinking the same thing. Suggesting ways to improve earnings, even for select legit publishers, would be a win-win-win that would be good for advertisers, Google, and publishers.

[avalon37]

Ok I can confirm it's just been horrible ad relevance the past couple of days by Google because I am seeing my most important advertiser showing back on my site. And this is not an advertiser who would have been "paused" - this was clearly Google tinkering which proved once again to be a failure for them and publishers.

[ken_b]

- traffic quality
- content quality
- user experience

Or something like that. At least give people a hint.

That would be very cool!

[MrSavage]

I would very much agree with it being more transparent. A scale? A grade? Level 1 Publisher - All Star, Level 2, etc. But regarding a smart priced label? I'm all for that. I would like to hear theories as to why this isn't likely to happen.

[netmeg]

Ok I can confirm it's just been horrible ad relevance the past couple of days by Google because I am seeing my most important advertiser showing back on my site. And this is not an advertiser who would have been "paused" - this was clearly Google tinkering which proved once again to be a failure for them and publishers.

There's a lot of reasons why an advertiser's ads might not be running on your site (or paused); there's just no way you can say it's *clearly* Google's tinkering.

Budget
Day parting
CPC
Placement Review by advertiser
Landing page changes
Campaign / Ad Group reorganization
New Creatives have to be approved
Competition on both advertiser and publisher side
Advertiser error

and the list goes on...

[avalon37]

Netmeg - with all due respect, I know for sure it was just Google tinkering.

[eeek]

You could potentially improve your earnings by working on your:

- traffic quality

Gee, that'd be nice. Care to explain how to change it?

[netmeg]

All due respect, I doubt it

Gee, that'd be nice. Care to explain how to change it?

Lucky for you, there's a whole long item here on some things you can do...

[webmasterworld.com...]

And that's just for starters.

[EditorialGuy]

I doubt if Google wants to encourage site owners to build their content around ad performance.

Fact is, some sites don't lend themselves to direct-response advertising, and it isn't Google's place to tell the site owners to change their editorial focus.

Consider:

John Doe publishes a blog about his round-the-world travels. His audience consists of armchair travelers who want to read about his adventures.

Jane Buck publishes a blog on how to organize your own round-the-world trip. Her audience consists of people who are researching where to go, what to do, and how to spend their money.

Both blogs may be of equal quality, but Jane Buck's is likely to perform better with AdSense. There isn't much that Google can do about that, unless it wants to tell John Doe to give up his travel-narrative blog and become a "how to" blogger.

[eek2121]

IMHO the easiest way to tell if you've been smart priced is to watch your US as well as UK traffic. If you are getting pennies from US/UK traffic you are probably smart priced.

[EditorialGuy]

Another thing to remember is that "smart pricing" isn't necessarily binary: It could easily be a sliding scale.