Hey Im back!! Any tips for improving my google adsense RPM??

[SheIsaBlogger]

Been a while!!

Ok my blog is starting to get traffic and adsense clicks every day (woohoo!) and I know Im sposed to split test and stuff to figure out what ad positions and settings will do the best but that's where Im kind of lost I dont know WHAT to test.

Does anyone have any advice or "easy wins" I could try to improve my RPM?

 

[Ryuzaki]

Placement:

• In Content
• Sidebar
• Footer
• Header

Alignment:

• Top / Middle / Bottom
• Float Left / Float Right / Aligned Center

Size:

• Squares
• Rectangles
• Banners
• Skyscrapers

Font:

• Font Color
• Font Size
• Font Type

Design:

• Border
• Background Color (blend or pop?)

Options:

• Text Only
• Image Only
• Text & Image

Number of Ads:

• 1
• 2
• 3
• Link Units too?

Responsive:

• Yes, Fully
• No
• Locked to certain size
• Using Media Queries

These would be your basic variables and the place to start. You should be able to squeeze out a definite gain. Let us know how it goes and what you do!

 

[jakesnke]

Check out this post - http://www.rankxl.com/3-techniques-improve-ctr/
TLDR: Floating side bar ad unit, ad unit under 1st paragraph, use red titles on text ads.
I saw a 16% increase in adsense revenue over 2 weeks and a 51% increase over 1 month. This is over a month that saw a 13% increase in traffic month over month.

 

[Samwise89]

From: https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/1354742?hl=en

@jakesnke

Some examples of unacceptable modifications include:​

• • Placing Google ads in a "floating box" in which ads scroll, hover, or expand over the webpage.

The rule here is vague, but I had to mention it just in case. What you're refering to sounds fair to me, and this rules makes me think of those hover-ads that cover content. But I'd play it safe.

 

[jakesnke]

Thanks for the heads up, I appreciate it. I do think that this rule is specifically for areas that expand over the content, forcing users to interact with it to view the content. For clarification, this is what I implemented: http://store.places-finder.com/cp-ajax-post-load - see how the sidebar sticks with you as you scroll down the page.

I just setup individual ad tracking in adsense, I will report back with which ad changes are having the most impact. If the sidebar is not the real driver of increased earnings I might dump it to play it safe, but if it is I am confident enough to leave it as is.

 

[Ryuzaki]

^ Yeah, I think that's safe too, as long as it's not covering content and forcing itself into people's faces. It's not a "pop up" or anything else bad. Just some jQuery. I doubt it'd alarm the Adsense bots, and if it did, a manual look would pass.

 

[secretagentdad]

Assuming you're being moderately aggressive with your ad placements I've never seen a situation where the best way to optimize adsense revenue wasn't leverage your existing brand to get more valuable traffic.

 

[SheIsaBlogger]

Assuming you're being moderately aggressive with your ad placements I've never seen a situation where the best way to optimize adsense revenue wasn't leverage your existing brand to get more valuable traffic.

Leverage my existing brand to get more valuable traffic? What does that mean? How do I do that? TY

 

[jakesnke]

@Samwise89 I did add the tracking to the sidebar ad unit, looks like it was the lowest performing ad unit of the three, pulling in just over 15% of the total revenue over a 30 day period.

Top unit does around 60% while the bottom unit does 25%.

I guess the next step would be to split test the earnings of a sidebar that scrolls vs one that does not.

 

[emp]

OK.. for everyone thinking a scrolling ad is good, some highlights from this very thread

From: https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/1354742?hl=en

Some examples of unacceptable modifications include:
Placing Google ads in a "floating box" in which ads scroll, hover, or expand over the webpage.​

.

Bolding mine.

So, Google sees scrolling ads as unacceptable, even if they are NOT covering content or expanding.

To add insult to injury, the sdidebar ads perform poorly.

@Samwise89 I did add the tracking to the sidebar ad unit, looks like it was the lowest performing ad unit of the three, pulling in just over 15% of the total revenue over a 30 day period.

My $.02
I'd play it safe and ditch the scrolling sidebar.

::emp::