Should I disable interest based ads and 3rd Party ads?

[Broaster]

I notice years ago when I first added Adsense to my blog back in 2010-2011 all the ads that showed up were matching my niche topic, like if I posted about cars it would show car ads,

now that I noticed most of the ads have nothing to do with my niche, then I find out that google changed this ad placement because they go off users search history, so if someone searches for womens clothing but then happens to see an interesting article in the google news section they will see womans clothing for a car website

Is this because I have interest based and 3rd party ads enabled?

or is this just the change that google made and there is nothing you can do about it?

I mean this obviously hurts click through rate and potential earnings, it would be nice to see ads that pertain to my subject matter like before I used to get a lot more clicks that way.

[TravisDGarrett]

Some will say that if you disable interest based ads, this is going to make your earning to collapse. Others will argue the opposite. So, the easiest is to run the experiment tool that Adsense provides. Like that you'll be able to tell what is best for "you".

Now, in my case, I have better results with interest based ads and Third party networks disabled.

[LuckyD]

Check out this thread, it answers some of your questions. [webmasterworld.com...]

[robzilla]

If available, both topical and interest-based ads will go into each auction, and the system will determine which ad is likely to perform the best. So if you predominantly see interest-based ads, apparently those are expected to earn you more money (balanced with a good user experience). On average, I'd say that personalized ads are indeed more likely to outperform topical ones.

Of course, you can just opt out [support.google.com] and see what happens.

[TravisDGarrett]

Of course, you can just opt out [support.google.com] and see what happens.

No, no, this is not a good idea. Don't opt out. Run an experiment instead. This is less risky; and this is the purpose of the experiment tool.

[londrum]

I think it’s got a lot to do with what kind of site you have. If you have a site that encourages people to buy stuff, and the ads are selling that exact stuff, then go for the contextual ads. But if you have an informational site then youll probably do better with interest based ads

[frankleeceo]

Check your adsense reports and figure out how much you get from those ads. If RPM is better than contextual, you will only lose money by disabling it. If RPM is worse? Worth the try.

Report -> Targeting types.

My RPM from personalized ads is double of contextual, personally.

I believe they are categorized as follow:

Personalized = interest based
Run of network = 3rd party.
Contextual = Adsense/adwords
Placement = Direct advertiser placement

[NickMNS]

@frankleeceo
What you say is not true. Even if the RPM is worse you will still loose money. AdSense is an auction, lower RPM ads bolster the demand and support prices. If you eliminate demand without adjusting supply, prices will fall regardless of where in the distribution you block the demand. Obviously, if you block the highest paying buyers you will get more of an impact, but even if you block your lowest paying ads the impact will still be negative.

The only reason that the ad-balancer is able to block the lowest paying ads and not impact your earnings, is that it is not just blocking but it is simultaneously removing the those ad slots from the auction, reducing supply.

Blocking personalized ads will negatively impact earnings. We tested it. See the link that LuckyD posted to another thread that answers this exact question last week. (Note to mods: you should probably merge the threads).

[frankleeceo]

@NickMNS

Adsense is an auction that auto adjusts itself with time goes.

Before your test, I am just wondering what is your earning % split for this report targeting types.

Personalized
Run of network
Contextual
Placement

Mine is roughly 65% Personalized / 20% Run of Network / 15% Contextual

With my split, my test also results in lowered earning. It was a no brainer given my split.

Only two people tested it and I think it was too small a sample size from that thread :), and it's not enough background information other than, "i tested it, it sucked".

I am hoping to see if someone with really high contextual percentage can see something different. That might have more ground to it is my belief.

(And I think my main point to OP was, if his personalized ad / third party already makes up a majority of his earning. Don't even bother testing).

[NickMNS]

For February:
55% Contextual
35% Personalized
7.6% run of the net
4.9% placements

I assume that my heavy handed use of Ad-Balancer probably has an impact on the weighting.

Yes the sample was small for me too. But the test was impacting about 50% of my impressions and dropping my earning in the range of 30 to 40%. That was a high to price to pay to prove to myself that my theory was correct.

[frankleeceo]

Thanks :). So it's safe to say one with 55% contextual earning will see negative big time. Your contextual percentage number is almost quadruple of mine relatively. Now we just have to see if anyone with a higher percentage can test and see how it goes.

[Broaster]

So keep interest based ads enabled but block the 3rd party ads is okay?

[TravisDGarrett]

So keep interest based ads enabled but block the 3rd party ads is okay?

Why don't you want to use the experiment tool of Adsense, to see what is best suitable to you ?

[NickMNS]

@Broaster if you are impacted by "brand-safety" (as I believe you are based on your other posts) then blocking 3rd part ads will cause a big decrease in coverage. Typically if you are seeing 70% coverage now you will be knocked down to 45 or 50%. You will also experience a further drop in earnings. But if you use backup ads to show ads from another network or affiliate (eg: media.net) then this will in fact be the optimal setup.

The reason being, specifically for brand-safety, all "new" page impressions AdWords is not participating in the auction but the auction proceeds regardless. There is a steep drop in demand and 3rd party networks are able to buy those impressions for pennies on the dollar. The ads slots are filled, but you get paid next to nothing. In other instances demand is so low that the ad request goes unfilled, so you get nothing. If you block 3rd party ads all "new page" requests will go unfilled, so 3rd parties will no longer be able to buy the inventory at a deep discount. This is why I say you will see a further drop in coverage. But if you backfill those unfilled request using backup ads with ads from another network like media.net (not a 3rd party to AdSense) then the AdSense 3rd parties will bid in the new auction with more robust demand and the price you will receive will be higher.

Let me be clear, by doing this your Adsense revenue will drop further, but you alternate revenue source(media.net) revenues should go up more than your AdSense revenue drop. I doubt that this will move your earnings back to where you might have been in early December but it will be as good as you can expect moving forward.

[Broaster]

TravisDGarrett I did a study or test a while back and it actually ruined my earnings I was barely earning anything but when I removed the interest based ads, and third party as suggested by another member on a different forum, he said give it a few months it takes a while, I didn't earn anything.

I think I was earning like 5 dollars a month before, but when I removed those settings I was only earning 1.25 for a month.

just curious what people think and from their experience

NickMNS

Thank you, I will leave the the interest based and third party.

Also with Media.net I haven't signed up just yet, but thought about it, if I sign up do I need a certain amount of traffic? or can I just sign up for it, how many ads should I use?

Right now I have the autobased ads and they put like 4 ads on my pages, the front pages gets a lot of ads, and I have one regular placed add but whats weird is the auto based random ads do not earn me anything, the only ad that is getting clicked is the regular ad that you place manually.

very strange.