Optimization Month, Week 2: Designing Your Ads

What if I told you that by making some simple changes to your ads, you could increase your revenue tenfold? And what if I said that by making some small adjustments to where you place the ads, to your colour schemes, and to the type of ads you use, you could even increase your revenue by a factor of 100?

Before you say anything, imagine you're a website owner in the mid-1990s. You own a large web property, and you've decided to increase your revenue stream through online advertising. Advertisers pay you each time their ads show, on a per-thousand basis. You need to place the ads somewhere people will see them. Looking at your site, you think, where? How about along the top, and down the right-hand side? Yes, that's where you've seen them on other sites, so they must be the best places.

Now, let's try that scenario today. You own a large web property, and you've decided to increase your revenue stream through Google AdSense. Advertisers pay you each time their ads show through site targeting, and also on a per-click basis. You need to place the ads somewhere people will see and interact with them. But where?

That's what we'll help you with this week. Did you know placing a traditional banner at the top of your site can be less than ideal for AdSense cost-per-click ads, but great for site-targeted CPM ads? Or that colour schemes designed to make your ads stand out will often make your users ignore those ads. What's more, by having AdSense integrated with quality content, users will stop seeing AdSense ads as advertising, and instead see them as relevant links to something they're interested in.

After having worked on optimisation in AdSense for a long time, we've amassed much learning through test after test. Even more important, we've learned from our failures at least as much as our successes. And now all of this is available to you, our publishers.

So go on. Spend 15 minutes reading this week's posts. Then with the recommendations in mind, spend another 15 minutes making the changes you and your users feel most comfortable with. Here's hoping it'll be the best (and most profitable) 30 minutes you'll have ever spent!

UPDATED with picture

Posted by Ivan Heneghan - AdSense UK Optimization Team

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

New partners added to the AdMob Mediation platform

Image
Showing ads from multiple ad networks increases competition in your app and can help you earn more revenue. AdMob Mediation offers you a way to manage many different networks to maximize your fill rate, all from a single interface. We’ve been adding new features to our mediation solution, such as ad network optimization , which dynamically generates the highest CPM for each ad from the ad networks in your mediation stack. And we’ve been continually adding ad networks , giving you more choice when selecting ad networks. Today, we’re excited to announce that we’ve added Vungle and Vpon as our newest mediation partners, with Vungle also supporting ad network optimization. Here’s what developers have to say about AdMob mediation: After integrating AdMob mediation and opting into ad network optimization, Bangkok-based company Sinoze saw its AdMob revenue grow by nearly 70% and overall revenue by 175%. To learn more about Sinoze’s big revenue uplift with their popular music app Thapster, c
Read more

Game developer Mobirix increases revenue from paying users by 44%

Image
“Gaming app users are often exposed to ads but when we show them AdMob in-app purchase (IAP) ads, we are able to convert some of them into paying users, which helps us generate more IAP revenue.” - Hyun Kwan Ro, Director, Mobirix Mobirix is a Korean mobile gaming developer and publisher that transitioned from creating games for feature phones to smartphones. Today, they have developed and published over 200 games for users around the world. Mobirix prides itself on creating great user experiences and not using push notifications, believing that users will come back to their apps without needing reminders. The problem After building a large user base, Mobirix looked at its monetization strategy to generate revenue. It started by working with a game developer to find a way to monetize its popular game, Zombiehive. At first, Mobirix’s game developer didn’t want to incorporate ads, but Mobirix understood that it was common for users to see ads and that mid-core and hard-core players were m
Read more

Explore the Google Play Developer Policy Center

Image
To maximize your app’s revenue potential, you’ll want to make sure your app is compliant with Google Play policies. If your app violates Google Play policy, ad serving can be disabled, so it’s a good idea to regularly review policy updates. The Developer Policy Center (found at play.google.com/policy ) was launched earlier this year and includes: Policies organized by themes, such as Monetization & Ads, Privacy & Security and Restricted Content Visual examples and detailed guidelines for the most common violations A simplified layout to help you navigate more intuitively on mobile or desktop An Updates section to help keep you informed of recent additions to Google Play policy  You can select a specific policy to learn more about it. Stay tuned to learn more about policy best practices - we’ll be posting a short video highlighting 10 tips to stay on the right side of Play policy. Until next time, be sure to stay connected on all things AdMob by following our Twitter , Linke
Read more