[Inside AdSense] Encouraging clicks

Many of you may remember our December post on the placement of images near ads. In that spirit, we'd like to remind you of a general policy issue: encouraging clicks.

As many of you know, our program policies prohibit any means of encouraging users to click on Google ads or bringing excessive attention to ad units. For example, sites may not contain phrases such as "click the ads," "support our sponsors," "visit these recommended links," or other similar language that could apply to the Google ads on your site. In addition, publishers are not permitted to label the Google ads with text other than "sponsored links" or "advertisements."

In light of this policy, you may be wondering if you're allowed to recommend your referral products to your users. As explained in Dan's post from February, unlike with AdSense for content ads, you can endorse your referral products by calling attention to the button or text link. If you believe in the quality of the product that you're referring, feel free to let your users know.

Generally, visitors should only click on Google ads if they're interested in the services being advertised. Encouraging them to click on your Google ads, either directly or indirectly, can lead to inflated advertiser costs -- and can cause an account to be disabled.

If you'd like to improve the performance of your ad units and attract more interested users, check out our Help Center's optimization tips to take full advantage of what AdSense has to offer.

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Posted by Mike Deeringer - AdSense Publisher Support

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Posted By Inside AdSense Team to Inside AdSense at 4/26/2007 10:50:00 AM
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[Inside AdSense] Korean AdSense Help Forum

To complement the recent launch of our newest AdSense blog in Korean, we're happy to announce the launch of our 11th AdSense Help Forum: AdSense 도움말 포럼 If you speak Korean, head over to the new forum to ask questions and share your AdSense knowledge with other publishers. A Google employee with the screen name of 'AdSensePro' will monitor the forum and offer assistance if necessary.

If you're still brushing up on your Korean, you can try one of our other forums in the meantime:

Chinese (Simplified)
Chinese (Traditional)
English
French
German
Japanese
Polish
Portuguese
Spanish
Turkish

Posted by Arlene Lee – AdSense Publisher Support

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Posted By Inside AdSense Team to Inside AdSense at 4/23/2007 09:15:00 AM
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[Inside AdSense] If it ain't broke...

We know how important it is to maintain the quality of your site and the experience your users have there, and we often receive email from publishers asking about specific ad implementations. While we encourage you to tailor your ads to fit the look and feel of your sites, we'd like to remind you to only use the options provided within the AdSense Setup tab of your account. As you may know, our program policies strictly prohibit altering the layout, behavior, targeting, or delivery of Google ads or AdSense for search boxes for any reason. Some examples of these modifications include:

- Implementing the AdSense ad code in a "floating box script"
- Manipulating the ad targeting using hidden keywords or IFRAMEs
- Altering the height or width of an ad unit
- Pre-populating the AdSense for search box with specific queries
- Creating direct links to AdSense for search results

Once you've generated the ad code in your account's AdSense Setup tab, we ask that you incorporate it into your pages exactly as it was generated, without altering any portion of the code. Doing so will also help ensure that you're properly credited for valid clicks and impressions.

For more information on working with your ads and improving their performance, feel free to visit our Help Center.

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Posted by Mike Deeringer - AdSense Publisher Support

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Posted By Inside AdSense Team to Inside AdSense at 4/19/2007 08:48:00 AM
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[Inside AdSense] Ήρθαμε! Am sosit!

We're happy to announce that we've just expanded our product offerings for two long-awaited languages: Greek and Romanian. Starting today, Greek and Romanian publishers can monetize their content by displaying targeted AdSense for content ads on their pages. As an added bonus, Romanian publishers can now implement AdSense for search as well.

If you're ready to get started with these languages, just log in to your AdSense account and follow the wizard located under the AdSense Setup tab. You can also contact the Greek team at adsense-el@google.com and the Romanian team at adsense-ro@google.com with additional questions.

Posted by Mariela Foumi (Greek) and Otilia Otlacan (Romanian) - AdSense Publisher Support

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Posted By Inside AdSense Team to Inside AdSense at 4/17/2007 10:57:00 AM
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[Inside AdSense] Spicier support for India

If you're an Indian publisher, you may have noticed some familiar-sounding names responding to your support questions regarding policies, payments, PINs, and other AdSense related issues. That's because we now have a team based in Hyderabad, and we're looking to improve the AdSense experience for Indian publishers.



We know many of our readers are Indian, so be on the lookout for case studies and tips specifically for you!

Posted by Shanti Nanisetti - Adsense India Publisher Support

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Posted By Inside AdSense Team to Inside AdSense at 4/16/2007 12:49:00 PM
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[Inside AdSense] DoubleClick acquisition

We have had a lot of questions about Google's announcement of our plans to purchase Doubleclick. Our goal is, as always, to improve the relevancy and efficiency of online advertising. This acquisition is a big win for you, our publishers, as well as for advertisers and Internet users.

For those of you who are not familiar with the company, here's some background. They have two flagship products: DoubleClick for Advertisers allows advertisers and ad agencies to traffic, serve and measure their online display campaigns; DoubleClick for Publishers provides ad inventory management.

Others of you are long time users of DoubleClick -- for over ten years, they've been working with buyers and sellers of Internet ads to help them plan, serve and measure their Internet campaigns.

Stay tuned to this blog as we will use it to provide you with more information about our plans with DoubleClick, including ways you as an AdSense publisher can benefit from DoubleClick's strong advertiser and agency customer base. You can continue to rely on the products and services from Google and DoubleClick as you always have.

For now, you can find out more in our Official Google Blog and in our press release.

Posted by Arlene Lee - AdSense Publisher Support

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Posted By Inside AdSense Team to Inside AdSense at 4/13/2007 03:22:00 PM
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[Inside AdSense] A note on traffic exchange programs

We understand that our publishers are always looking for ways to attract interested users to their sites. But using third-party tools or services to increase your site traffic may lead to invalid clicks or impressions and result in your account being disabled. For this reason, we'd like to provide you with some guidance about this.

As many of you already know, our program policies strictly prohibit any means of artificially generating ad impressions or clicks, including third-party services such as paid-to-click, paid-to-surf, auto-surf, and click-exchange programs. These programs offer incentives for users to view web pages or click on ads, resulting in activity that is harmful to our advertisers.

We occasionally receive questions from publishers interested in using traffic exchanges to bring traffic to their site. While these services may help advertise your site, we don't recommend using them, as they may also result in similar invalid activity. We realize that you may have questions about a specific traffic service and whether it could potentially create invalid impressions or clicks. However, please understand that we're unable to comment on any particular third-party service.

As a parting note, we encourage you to read through our tips and guidelines and Webmaster Guidelines to help keep your account in good standing. These guidelines advise publishers to "Provide unique and relevant content that gives users a reason to visit your site first," and we feel this is ultimately the best way to attract more visitors to your site and build a truly loyal audience.

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Posted by Mike Deeringer - AdSense Publisher Support

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Posted By Inside AdSense Team to Inside AdSense at 4/12/2007 06:31:00 AM
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[Inside AdSense] Must-read policy Thursdays

Flossing. Wearing sunscreen. Eating leafy greens. Intellectually, we know we're supposed to do these things, but it can be hard to actually buckle down and do them. The same thing is true for the AdSense program policies. You probably know the policies exist, and you know you ought to be complying with them. Still, making sure that your site stays squeaky clean policy-wise can sometimes take a little more mental effort than most of us might be willing to spare.

That's why we're beginning a weekly series of posts to help bring AdSense policies to the front of your minds -- and your sites. On coming Thursdays, you can look forward to information about:

steering clear of possible invalid clicks

nurturing harmonious relationships between ads and images

why asking visitors to click your ads is a bad idea, even if you say please

We believe every publisher has the potential to be a model publisher. It's our aim to get you on the right track with some helpful tips and explanations.

After we begin our series, you might want to talk AdSense policy with your fellow publishers. So we'll be starting threads for each post in the AdSense Help Forum -- head on over after reading each post to share your thoughts.

Posted by Julie Beckmann - AdSense Publisher Support

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Posted By Inside AdSense Team to Inside AdSense at 4/11/2007 04:47:00 PM
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