7 replies to this topic

[glen]

Hi everyone,

I was just reading a thread on the digital point forum and am glad to hear that google has released yet one more Ad Type.

A picture is worth a thousand words, so see below the new Horizontal ad links. These are something we can slip in almost anywhere. I am looking forward to experimenting with these.

EDIT - I have just added some horizontal links under my website logo. I think this will be a good spot!

Cheers, Glen

[lytrix]

Uhm...Half of the time, I don't even notice new things offered from Ad Sense haha. Anyhow, my thoughts of those horizontal links as follows:
1. They're indeed sneaky! However, I think that kind of sneakiness might disappoint your visitors from treating your site seriously?
2. In the case of AdSenseForums.net, I think it's pretty simple to place those links, but I don't see where on my site that I can place those links (just for exampl).
3. Those horizontal links are still binded in a block like a typical adsense block, but just squashed horizontally? So then it's kinda hard to implement anywhere because basically takes up a whole row of space.

Anyhow, those are just my thoughts about the down side of horizontal links. I think it's good to trap first time users, but they'll learn quick and the effectiveness is probably not as good as the standard ones in the long run.

[glen]

Hi lytrix, My initial observations so far have given me some pretty good results on one of my other sites.

However, the ads on the adsense forum site are not performing well at all.
I believe the reason is because of the more technically minded visitors who find the adsense forums site - they are better able to determine what is an ad and what is not!

So definitely give them a go and see how they perform. If I were you I would try one near the top of your forum. Put them below the line with -

"Home Community Organizer Files Contents Site Search Support"

Cheers, Glen

[lytrix]

Thanks for the tips Glen, I guess I'm too chicken to put those links up on the top (I've been thinking about blending it into the menu bar). So I did on my test board by inserting it as footer links. You can see them here at the bottom of the page: http://www.enteracti.../mods/index.php?

I wonder if those will get clicked at on if I were to put them on a real site...lol

UPDATE: After some messing around with the html templates. I think the ideal place is right where the navstrip is (but I centered it). You'll see what I mean from the URL above. It's actually closer to the content than what AdSenseForum has right now. I removed the the footer idea cuz I just don't think anyone will scroll that far down the page...haha

[glen]

thanks looks pretty good! but you actually gave me another idea

...what would happen if you actually put them IN PLACE OF -
"Gallery ChatBox Help Search Members Referral Calendar FAQ My Portal Shoutbox"?

OR

put them directly above or below these links but IN the light blue Nav Bar area?

Provided that the font was the same, people might be attracted to the links thinking they were in fact navigation links.

I will investigate this further if i can figure where to add them into the HTML templates.

Cheers, Glen

[lytrix]

glen, on Jun 22 2005, 02:20 AM, said:

thanks looks pretty good! but you actually gave me another idea

...what would happen if you actually put them IN PLACE OF -
"Gallery ChatBox Help Search Members Referral Calendar FAQ My Portal Shoutbox"?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I actually tried that by having the horizontal links starting at where IPB Guidelines would normally start. The challenge is to have it blend in with the background which is in gradient. Aslo, for the chicken me, I'm afraid that's too much for people to handle. lol let me know when you have your improved version out

[lytrix]

I just realized that when you click on a horizontal ad-link ads, it doesn't take you directly to the advertiser, but instead, takes you to a google page with a list of ads (usually 5 or 6). I'm guessing if the person clicking that link bails out at that point, it won't be counted as a clik-through? In that case, I'm doubting the effectiveness of such ad-link.

[glen]

hi lytrix,

you are quite right about 2 clicks being involved before you earn anything with an Ad Link.

however, i have found that the click through rate (CTR) is still good in some cases and i will continue to use ad links on some of my sites. however the ad link (above) on this adsenseforums.net site does not perform very well so i may remove it soon. then again, this site is not getting a heap of traffic so far so it might be premature to remove it just yet.

Why would an Ad Link work on one site and not another?
I think it comes down to the type of visitors you have....and how IT savvy they are. the smarter the visitor (in a computer/IT/web sense) the less likely they will click on an Ad Link. I think the less savvy IT user will often mistake the ad links for a navigation bar and once they make the first click, they will also make a second "earning" click (because they don't know about "back" buttons and the like).

So which ad would an IT savvy person click on?
I am still trying to figure that one out. As an example, here are the ads I am currently being displayed in the skyscraper ad on the left of the screen -

Quote

$4000 Checks from Adsense
Step-by-Step System Teaches You To Create A Massive Auto-Pilot Income.
AdsenseEmpire.biz
 
Top Adsense keywords
List of the highest paid keywords Why settle for pennies?
top-sense.com

$43,000 per/mo Adsense
Access Secrets & Tools Yourself Specialized Training Available
RevenueInsider.com

Swap Clix™ for Cash
Make over $18,000/month. Place Ads like this!
SwapClix.com

AdSense Revenue Checker
Simple to use tray icon tool to check your current AdSense earnings
RevenueCheckerForAdSense.com

Perhaps we could do a poll on which is the most attractive ad? A running theme seems to be "offering the world". Presumably these adwords users have been in the business for a while so perhaps they have come to the conclusion that this is the best way to get IT people to click on an ad?

Would be interested to hear the opinions of others.

cheers, glen