August 6, 2007

New AdSense Ad Units Spotted!

Today I noticed a new type of AdSense ad showing up on my blog, so I took some screenshots. They're regular ad units, but they've got some extra links in them.

Here's what the ad looked like on my blog.


And here's the actual ad itself. As you can see, it's got some additional links below the black text.


Now the question, is what will this do for our CTR? And what kind of ads are they? For example, when I hovered my mouse over "RSS Feed" I saw this:

javascript:gurl('ChBGtsWPAAvTQo4U1MgRmVlZBvxCfEgtDigBSLTkrw4')

Apparently, when they're clicked on, a new ad displays in the same ad block. But I don't know this for certain. It was stated in a comment I had read on another blog and I'm about to click on my own ads to find out.
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Posted on 8/06/2007

5 comments:

  1. That's interesting. At least they don't look bad. I'll keep my eyes open for any info on them.

    Tom
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  2. Thanks Tom, I appreciate it!

    Shine on,
    Aaron
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  3. This is an intriguing new ad unit format. Did you do anything to your code, to cause these newfangled ad units to appear, or did they just automatically do so?


    Also, on another topic - I came to this blog entry of yours, via your comment in this thread... Before coming here, I went to this blogger's entry, for the same reason (though I now see, despite my comment there, that his image is in fact loading).

    My question is that, I see, at the actual Adsense unit, at the top of that blog entry (underneath the entry's title), he uses a light blue background.

    I notice however, that your ad unit's background is the same color as your web page's background (white). You also use orange links in your ad unit, just like your web page has.

    In Joel Comm's book however, I think he said that while he used to advocate that people made their Adsense links the same color as their web page's link color, he now advocates that people make their Adsense links blue, because that's the color that people are most used to seeing links as.

    On a YouTube advice video, from someone else, that guy (not Joel Comm, someone else), advised making Adsense links blue, but said that alternatively, you can make them whatever color your web page's links are.

    Have you done the testing, with this? Would you advise making your Adsense link color the same color as your web page's link color? Or did you just decide to do that (without testing to see if blue would be better)?

    I'm not criticizing your decision; I'm just wondering if you've tested, and discovered which of those options works best.

    I wish there was someone who I could speak to, who uses Adsense... But almost no one who I knows does so. (Actually, some of those who I communicate with on AIM probably do, but I don't get into that many AIM conversations with blogger, like I used to, in the past... And back then, I wasn't using Adsense.) So, it is these type of Blogosphere comment interactions, that are the best I can do, as of now. Any information or advice you (and others) could provide, is very much appreciated. Thank you!
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  4. Hi there. Aakash posted this question over at my blog too (as mentioned in his comment) here:

    Google Testing New Ad Combo Format

    I'll post my answer here as well, as I believe it to be highly relevant (considering it's the same question :)

    Aakash:

    In regards to your questions, I can only give you my personal experience. No two websites will monetize the same way, but there do seem to be some constants.

    About the background, right now I am testing exactly that. Through past experience, ads with the same color as the background (white, in my case) perform better than backgrounds that stand out. I will be switching to only white backgrounds here soon, as testing has proved it to be the clear winner. I originally tested the #EBF2F8 color for my ad background, as it's the same color as my blockquotes, so I figured it would blend well. I like white better.

    With the color of links, you definitely want to test on your own site using the "A/B Testing" method (I'll post about it soon.) I try to keep my AdSense links on all of my sites slightly darker than the normal link color, but I've been making them increasingly darker recently, as through testing, I've noticed a general trend suggesting that the darker the link, the more clicks I get. Again, be sure to test this yourself and keep me updated on your results.

    I agree that people tend to ignore ads, but mainly only intrusive ads (flashing, spinning banners, etc.) In my experience, AdSense and other similar contextual ads don't turn people off too much.

    You mentioned you would like having someone to talk to about AdSense. I have quite a bit of experience, so please feel free to give me your questions and thoughts.
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  5. Thanks Egon. Much appreciated! I'm in the process of answering Aakash's question as well in order to help him maximize his AdSense CTR.

    Shine on,
    Aaron
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