Most effective ad formats & placements

[Leo_Bloom]

Hi there,

I am considering a site redesign, and I have never used a leaderboard at the very top of a page, or a 300x250 at the top right of the page -- something I see quite often on the web.

I was wondering if anyone can give me a feel for what kind of click through rates are typical for those ad formats/placements?

I've also been wondering about leaderboards on a mobile site. Are they effective?

And, of course, if you have any other suggestions, it would be great to hear them.

Thanks in advance,
Leo

[netmeg]

"It depends"

Seriously, we're all in such different circumstances, what's good for me might be totally different for you. All you can do is try.

I use leaderboards on my responsive sites, and it's my highest paying ad unit for every device. A huge percentage of my traffic is mobile (up to 80% at peak)

Your mileage may vary.

[ember]

My best performing ad size is the 336x280. So as netmeg says, it varies site by site. Testing is key.

[Elsmarc]

I took a site I have which has done well for many years, but ads were paying significantly less and less. Site pages all had the typical 3 ads per page on every page. I removed all the ads from all pages except "thread" pages in the site forum where I reduced to 2 ads per page - One after the first post and one after the second post on a page. Within 2 months income doubled. The site is almost ad free these days but adsense income has over doubled.

You never know until you try something what will happen. I plan on reducing ads on other sites over the coming months. In part I hope that fewer ads will irritate people less and "time on site" will go up.