Google has been updating and giving makeover to many of its services in the past few months. That includes its AdWords and AdSense programs. Google now plans to change the way ads are displayed in the SERPs. Ads that used to be shown in the side may now be shown below the top listings. (more…)

Advertising using Google Adwords could be quite costly, especially if you don’t really know what you are doing. Many of people who advertise using this system also spend a lot of time optimizing their sites for the search engines. Of course, Google does not want you to believe paid ads could possibly cannibalize your organic clicks. That’s why the company has posted a study that demonstrates ads drive 89% incremental traffic.

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Many publishers rely on Adsense ads to stay afloat as a business.  You may not be able to make millions from your Adsense account but every dollar that you make counts. I have seen the temptation in some publishers to include adult type content on their sites to increase their earnings from other networks. The trouble is you could get kicked out of Adsense, even though you are not trying to target Adsense with those adult articles.

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Nobody likes getting the dreaded account suspension email from Google. Google does not suspend everyone who is breaking the rules. Just because you have been doing it long enough and gotten away with it, that does not mean Google won’t catch you eventually. One of our colleagues had his account suspended by Google for not doing anything at all. He did have a bunch of “make money online” campaigns that were paused. Paused campaigns are still reviewed by Google’s team though. (more…)

When you are making a ton of money from Adsense, it is easy to get complacent and go overboard with your tactics. Google Adsense does have policies that every publisher needs to pay attention to. Google usually does not completely boot users from their programs unless their offense is something huge. It provides it publishers with notifications which need to be addressed in a certain amount of time. Google discussed these on its website:

• Received a notification asking you to make changes within three business days: Here is a detailed overview on what you need to do and know. Please keep in mind that you don’t need to let us know if you have simply fixed the violation.
• Ad-serving has been disabled to your site: Read our Help Center article for more information on why this may have happened.
• Received a notification stating your AdSense account may be disabled: By reading this information you may be able to get your AdSense account back in good standing. (more…)

Those of you who have been using Google Adwords to drive traffic to your business know that it does not exactly provide you with the most accurate traffic estimates for your keywords. Many advertisers would love to get more accurate information from their ad serving partners to better optimize their campaigns. Google has now updated its algorithm to offer more quality information to advertisers:

You can find keyword traffic estimates in a number of places across AdWords including the Traffic Estimator, the Keyword Tool, and on the Keywords tab… One of the most common uses of traffic estimates is to evaluate potential keywords and decide whether you should add them to your account. Traffic estimates are also useful in determining if your bids and budgets are appropriate for these new keywords. (more…)

There is simply no doubt that Facebook is one of the hottest places to be involved in for online advertiser and small business. The community is growing fast and offers opportunities not available through other channels. Facebook was responsible for 23% of display ad impressions in the previous quarter. That beats Yahoo!’s numbers by a mile. According to a report released by Comscore, Facebook produced 297 billion online display ad impressions last quarter, out of the total 1.3 trillion impressions. Microsoft and Yahoo are still big players but they were just blown away by Facebook. So why is Facebook so successful?

The ability to buy specific audiences is enabling a greater number of display ads to be delivered on target, display formats are improving at a rapid rate, and the quality of creative is getting better every day. As publishers prove the value of online display ad campaigns, digital should continue to carve out a bigger piece of the advertising pie, (more…)

For Google, training its advertisers means more revenue for the company. The more people it can get on board with all its advertising services, the better off the company will be over the long run. Of course, Google does not mind people making more sales and converting more. Those all mean advertisers will come back for more. Mobile advertising is on the rise and Google wants you to be involved. That’s why the company is hosting an interactive training session to train its advertisers. Here are the details per Google: (more…)

Google is out to make life easier for small and large advertisers. Those of us who have been around Adwords for a few years have known that it needed some re-organizing. Google is finally putting the final pieces together in that regard. The Report Center, which has become redundant with Google moving reports to the Campaign tab, will retire in the next “few weeks.” Here is how Google put it:

If you’re currently downloading reports from the Campaigns tab, you’ve already adjusted to the bulk of the changes, and you’ll find that each of your scheduled reports have been copied to the Control Panel & Library. We’ll delete any old versions of scheduled reports from the Reports tab, and stop sending the emails associated with them, by early November. Shortly thereafter, we’ll remove the Report Center entirely. (more…)

Google can be quite strict when it comes to enforcing those trademarks. Funnily enough, the company is anything but consistent when it comes to doing that in the U.S. It is pretty lenient when it comes to bidding on other companies trademarks (it’s actually Google’s policy because it’s good for its bottom-line). That approach is getting adopted in Europe too. Google is going to put trademark terms up for auction. That might increase the quality of ads, according to Google anyway, but it could also make it expensive for small businesses and startups to bid on their own trademarks.

People have argued for and against this approach in the past. There is nothing with Toshiba bidding on Apple branded terms and trademarks. Besides, having the ability to challenge top companies in a niche from the get go is good for businesses (and for Google’s bottom-line too).

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