26 Tips To Increase Google AdSense Earnings

Now that you've probably learned how to make money with Google Adsense, but to help you improve your AdSense performance (and advertising revenue), here are some of the best Google Adsense Tips and Tricks I have:

a. Strictly follow the rules mentioned in Adsense policies. You will always earn more revenue from Adsense by playing it clean.

b. Never modify the Google Adsense HTML code. If have trouble embedding AdSense code in your WordPress or Blogger template, ask for help on the AdSense support forums or send an email to your AdSense account manager.

c. Never ask your friends or visitors to click on your Google ads. Google takes click fraud very seriously. Do not include incentives of any kind on your site for users to click on your ads. Don't label Google ads with text other than "sponsored links" or "advertisements.".

d. Don't click on your own ads - Google is much smarter than you think and can discover invalid clicks through IP addresses, site navigation patterns, etc. If you working on a new design for your site, avoid reloading your pages (with AdSense) excessively. You can turn off AdSense temporarily and avoid invalid CPM impressions. Or you can use the unofficial Google Adsense Sandbox Tool that is accessible from Firefox, IE and other browsers to see what kind of Google ads will be served based on content (website address URL) or keywords.

e. Don't place ads in pop-up windows, error pages or even empty pages. Update: With the new AdSense policy change, you can probably place ads on 404 pages. Check with the AdSense support team.

f. Don't start a "adsense asbestos" or "home equity loan rates" website merely to make money from accidental clicks. You will never make money out these Made for Adsense websites. Instead, write on topics what you are passionate about. Don't waste your money on high-paying Adsense keywords lists. Stay away from AdSense Adwords arbitrage.

g. For short articles, CTR is best when ads are placed just above the content.

h. For long articles, CTR will improve if you place ads somewhere in middle of the content or just where the article ends - when visitors are done reading the article, they may be looking for related resources.

i. Use Text Ads instead of Image Ads as users get more options and the payout is often higher. If you still want to display image ads (for CPM), consider ad formats like the 300x250 medium rectangle or the 160x600 wide skyscraper as they support also support rich multimedia and the new gadget ads.

j. Google Ads with no background color and no borders will always perform better. Make the border color and background color same as your page background color.

k. Always put ads above the main fold. Make sure that the ad unit with the highest clickthrough rate is the first instance of the ad code that appears in your HTML source. Since the first ad unit is always filled before the rest, you want to make sure that ad unit is located in the best placement on your page.

l. Try setting the ad link URL color to a lighter shade. If your text is black, you may make the adlink as light gray or something like #666.

m. Go Wide - The large rectangle (336x280) is the best paying Adsense format especially for text ads. Try using the 336x280 large rectangle, 300x250 medium rectangle, or 160x600 wide skyscraper.

n. Don't places images next to Google ads as that will invite a permanent ban to your AdSense account.

o. Blend AdLinks with other navigation links or place horizontal adlinks at the top of your webpage. AdSense publishers are permitted to click on link unit topics on their web pages, provided that they do not click on any Google ads on the resulting page.

p. You should try adding a unit near the comments senction of your blog. See more AdSense tweaks.

q. You can put upto 3 adsense units on a page. Try putting a large skyscraper on the right navigation sidebar of your website. That area is close to the browser scrollbar. You can also add 2 AdSense for search boxes and 3 adlink units.

r. The first few lines of your content are an important factor for determining what Ads are served on your webpage. That's the right place to put keywords in bold (strong or &ltb> tags) or header tags (h1, h2, etc).

s. Always select the setting to open Google Adsense search box results in a new browser window, so you won't lose your visitors. Click the Open search results in a new browser window checkbox and this add target="google_window" to your form tag.

t. Many people think the search box is on the top right corner. So you know where to put it.

u. Always syndicate full text RSS feeds and then monetize your feeds with a 468x60 ad in RSS feeds.

v. Monitor the AdSense performance of individual web pages with Google Analytics

w. For low CTR pages, try changing titles or adding more relevant content to get better focused ads. Alse see: Get relevant Google Ads

x. Block low paying advertisers with Filters. Why lose a visitor for an ad that will only pay you a cent. Use Overture or Google Adwords Keywords tool to discover keywords that are less popular with advertisers.

y. Learn how to implement AdSense Revenue sharing if you run a site with multiple authors and need to pay your writers based on advertising revenue generated from their articles.

z. Experiment with color schemes and layouts using split testing. You are the best judge when it comes to choosing ad formats for your own website.

Marketing Your Website Without Search Engines

I’m not old enough to remember what the internet was like without search engines. Apparently, there were lists of web-servers: they were manually updated and publicized in news updates like this. And then the search engines came crawling, indexing and sorting out pages. As the web expanded with more users and businesses putting up websites, search engines became an essential way to immediately find information.

There’s a common saying: build your site for visitors, not for search engines. A famous Google webmaster guideline asks the question: “Does this help my users? Would I do this if search engines didn’t exist?” It’s actually quite a challenge: Pretend search engines don’t exist. How can you grow your website, get visitors and make lots of money?

I recently built a couple of sites without any focus on search engine rankings and getting organic search traffic. I didn’t block the search bots from indexing the site but I optimized nothing. Didn’t focus on site link architecture, title tags, meta-descriptions, meta-keywords, link building, competitor analysis. Forget about search engine algorithms.

I also wasn’t interested in methods of search-based marketing like finding long tail phrases and placing them on article directories or social media properties in order for these pages to rank and send traffic to my site. That would have involved researching search keywords and competition, so I did nothing of that sort too.

Ultimately, you’re dealing with a situation where the convenience offered by search engines is non-existent. No quick answers to quick questions for everyone. So how are people going to find what they need? How are they going to find my site?

Without search engines, people will do what they’ve been doing for thousands of years. They rely on each other. They rely on the community, on the collection of publications known within their geographic location or industry. They rely on word of mouth. And they also rely on getting information from common resources like a public square, library, forum or marketplace.

Go where people gather. There you will be heard. It sounds like rudimentary marketing but quite honestly, until I’ve tried ignoring search engines and focusing exclusively on gathering points, I didn’t realize how much actual marketing I was NOT doing.

There were far more forums, social networking sites, blogs than I ever imagined even for small niches. And then there are mega-sites like Youtube and Facebook. If I were to put a number to it, I would say I’m missing out on at least a few thousand visitors every day by NOT being active in these online communities. And that doesn’t include offline marketing.

This is a good amount of visitors who are likely to become supporters of your content, clients or buyers. And the truth is I’ve always made money much faster by going to them instead of waiting for them to come to me. It sure beats the usual plan of waiting for my site to get indexed, rank for longtail phrases and THEN hopefully convert into an ad click or sale.

Traffic from these sites can be as targeted as search engine visitors: many are looking for recommendations from peers or actively engaged in a specific activity that is relevant to my site. But unlike search visitors, they aren’t coming in blind into your website from a query.

They know more than your page name, url and meta-description. They know your avatar, they know your history of contributions. They have a rough idea of who you are. Your words are in their face before they even click over. You’ve already presold them by making yourself familiar.

The most common problem we face is the lack of time. Can we outsource something like forum, blog or social site marketing? Yes, of course. But use people who know what they’re doing or else you’ll be wasting your time. If you’re a one-person operation, it might not be good for your brand to have someone that’s not you out there, even if you have an excellent ghost.

But small businesses, big businesses and multi-author content sites? No problem.

In any case, the whole experience of marketing without search engines is educational. It forced me to go out and represent my brand. This is me, I own this website. Hello, here’s what I do. Take a look. Here’s why this will be interesting.. and so on.

Once again, nothing revolutionary but when you’re not depending on search engines, its a make-or-break situation. How can I not just get clicks but the most value out of each click? What web page should I link to, who should I target, what content angle to use etc.

It forced me to work and persuade on a social level you don’t really think about because you’re always focused on existing traffic/users or things that will improve a machine’s reading of your site’s worth. Then you realize the value in having a strong brand and reputation.

I would recommend that you try pretending that search engines don’t exist, even just for a week or so. Especially if you’ve got a new website. Search engine traffic is invaluable but there’s a lot of visitors out there just waiting for you to show them your site.

If you’ve already reached a plateau in organic search traffic and its not making you as much money as you like, why not focus on promoting your site outside of search engines?

So, how would you market your website if search engines didn’t exist?

Via Dosh Dosh.

How to Write Effective Product Reviews for Successful Affiliate Marketing

Publishing product reviews is the best way to attract potential customers and earn affiliate commissions. This is why affiliate marketers constantly find themselves writing reviews for all sorts of products. However, simply describing a product will not work for affiliate marketing. If you want to make money out of affiliate marketing, your product reviews must be convincing. To ensure that your product reviews will bring you affiliate commissions, follow the steps below:

1) State a Problem

At the beginning of your review, you need to state a problem or issue that your target market faces. Recognizing the desire for something will also work. This way, anyone who relates with the problem, issue, or desire will be more likely to read on.

2) Outline the Solution

Describe a general solution to whatever it is that you used as an introduction. In this section, illustrate what the product can do without mentioning what the product is. Doing this will give readers an impression of what an ideal product is.

3) Introduce the Product

This is the portion where you introduce your product as having the exact characteristics as what you just described as an ideal product. This will help readers quickly realize the importance of the product you are reviewing.

4) Describe the Product

Outline the benefits of what you are reviewing in terms of addressing the problem, issue, or desire you stated. It would be best if you could recount your own experience with the product so that readers will get a better idea of what they can gain out of it. This is also the part where you can state flaws or disadvantages but make it clear that the benefits outweigh the drawbacks.

5) Summarize Your Review

This is where you restate everything you have described in a few simple sentences. By doing this, you reinforce all the product benefits in your readers' minds.

The steps above will help you compose convincing product reviews. Follow them and you will find that you can make money out of affiliate marketing almost effortlessly.