When we go to a blog and if we are greeted by a large amount of ads, we leave! Is it the amount all alone that matters? If you are thinking of whether to add in an ad panel into your blog or not, this is an article for you.
Relevance
This is the first thing that I will look at before I decide whether a new ad network is suitable for by blog. This is really important, earnings-wise and readability-wise. Although sometimes you can get some random click that might be from curious readers, misclicks and even click loves, the earnings you will get with a targeted ads will be much more higher. Removing irrelevant ads will open up more spaces for ads which are relevant and at the same time,your click through rate and earnings can be optimised.
Many asked me to try out Widget Bucks which is consumer electronics and other consumer items-related on Wayne Liew Dot Com which is consumer electronics and other consumer items related but I won’t. Wayne Liew Dot Com is on blogging and Widget Bucks definitely won’t get the attention and will remain in my readers’ blindspot. Instead, I have signed up for Advert-Revenue which has been running on my blog for 3 full days and I have already earned $5 with it! The relevant ads by them on money making and sometimes, guides for webmasters surely helps.
Placement
Another considerations that I will make is where I will place the panel. This step is to search for a place that will bring you maximum click throughs but at the same time, the ad panel will not irritate your readers. Popular ad placing spots are headers, sidebars and the space between the post and comments but still you will need to evaluate things properly. Don’t just try to place your ad panels above the fold.
If you continue to scroll down on Wayne Liew Dot Com, you will find that upon reaching the bottom, you can see another ad panel. That little ad panel is not useless. The bottom part of Wayne Liew Dot Com still have contents and that panel will certainly be seen and sometimes clicked. Also, I don’t stuff all my ads into my sidebar all the way to the bottom.
Design
When I plan to put in an ad panel, I will make sure the colours and if it is a banner, the design will suit perfectly into my theme. This is an important psychology factor. If a visitor enters your site and it is the ad panels like those flashy “You Have Just Won 1 Million” banners that stand out from others, for sure he/she will have the false impression that your site contains a lot of ads. I have a one for all solution for you if you want to have the chance to fit ad panels or banners of various colours, especially dynamic banner ads from Advertlets or Tribal Fusion into your blog.
First, head over to Techcruch and look at their sidebar. The banners in their sidebars are formed of different colours but why is it that it seems well to you? It is because of the white background. A white background can fit things in well. This is why when I first started Wayne Liew Dot Com, I chose a theme which offers me a primary colour and a white background, just like what Techcruch has.
Amount
This is a common thing. Abundance of ads will make all your placement and design efforts nothing. You might have placed all the ads in the right place but having too much of it will give out the message that you want to make money rather than sharing information. I know many ad networks like Advert-Revenue wanted their panels to appear above the fold but when this kind of situations come to you, you can choose one out of them and discard the another.
The optimum amount of ads for me is that an ad panel is being shown every 1024×960 fold of the site. This means wherever my visitors go, they will only see one ad, nothing more and nothing less. This can actually make you fit in a lot of panels into your blog. You didn’t realise this because bloggers always wanted to stuff their ads high or right at the bottom of their site (I don’t know why).
Performance
After you have chosen what ad network is right for your blog. Optimise, put it in and don’t remove it until you cash out. If it is not performing well, even you have done all of the evaluation aspects I have shared above, optimize it more by switching the ad positions, change the colour if it is a text ad and so on. Remember, don’t remove it if you had really evaluate the network well and you have put in a lot of effort to monetize your blog with the network. This is explained thoroughly in “If You Don’t Hit Your Minimum Payment Now, You’ll Hate Yourself Later” written by Hyder.
Share With Me
What other things that you will consider when deciding whether to place an ad panel into your blog or not? Are you satisfied with the amount of ads and the placement of ad panels at Wayne Liew Dot Com? Tell me about your thoughts on what I’ve written above. Until the next post, happy money making with your ad panels! 
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November 4th, 2007 at 10:48 pm
Placement and avoiding clutter is very important for effective ads.
November 5th, 2007 at 1:26 am
yeah, ads if placed in the wrong place, tends to be annoying….
November 5th, 2007 at 10:25 am
I would rather remove the ads if the paying is not promising. After all after removing the ads, I’ve more place to try on other products.
November 5th, 2007 at 11:10 am
i hate ads, that’s why you can’t see any ads on my blog…
November 5th, 2007 at 11:56 am
wayne thank for the link..actually what you says about Relevance is correct…what I do is, I will join the ads network, try on mysite and see the relevance and performance..
If the ads give a good performance it will stay on my site if not the ad can get out…
that what widget buck get.
November 5th, 2007 at 6:35 pm
@ Sumesh
Yes, especially when we want our blogs to be user-friendly.
@ kljs
Most bloggers don’t look at things from the readers point of view.
@ yung .
It took me some time before I have decided to take Nuffnang off my blog because I have about MYR10+ with them but that is way too low.
@ Edward
I know some don’t like them but I need them to break even with my hosting fees and some reward for my blogging.
@ dott-com
No wonder I see Wb on your blog. I place my WB in another blog but it is not performing as well.
November 6th, 2007 at 4:21 am
I’m considering my ad placement while I design the new theme for my blog. I don’t plan to go overboard, just 2-4 125×125 ads and maybe a skyscraper ad. Nice article about placement and colors.
November 6th, 2007 at 7:09 pm
I think you should make it clearer for other newbies in terms of relevance and placement. These 2 aspects are the top 2 issues a new publisher needs to deal with before optimizing the layout and design of the site.
I’ve seen some blogs putting those WB and other similar ads which have nothing to do with their blogs especially blogs with mostly non-US teen visitors. They just don’t understand that getting clicks are already very difficult and converting clicks to sales are even harder… Only if the blogs and ads are relevant to each other that the clicks will be generated.
By the way, do you mind disclosing the number of pageviews and filling rate for the $5-for-3-days? I’m curious and want to compare it with BurstMedia. Anyway, I’m sure it’ll be much better than Advertlets. I only get about RM1.20 for almost 3000 pageviews. It’s pathetic.
November 6th, 2007 at 7:53 pm
@ Erik Karey
Thanks for commenting on my blog. You will sure have a nice upcoming theme as the one you are using now is pleasant for me.
@ Ginn Wei
I guess my examples for those is clear enough, maybe I will elaborate much more on how to place ads correctly after I conduct a deeper research, the article is still under construction.
Yes, they somehow tend to follow a buzz but what they didn’t realise is that they are clogging their blog rather than monetising it. WB only pays for clicks and they will not pay if the click turns into a sale and maybe this is thereason why webmasters love them.
Advert-Revenue has a CPM rate of $1 which means for every 1000 impressions. I doubt that it will be exactly the same since my impressions in their records is lesser than 5000 (clicks might be taken into account). Sorry for not disclosing my real stats. This is because it is not time to be shown yet. You can check my Alexa page views though, it can be accurate as I don’t manipulate them
November 7th, 2007 at 7:23 pm
You are able to get $5 for less than 5000 impressions because they are no longer paying a flat rate of $1 CPM. I’ve long suspected this and that is the main reason I’m asking for more details from you. $1 CPM is too good to be true because even large networks are not able to pay that much unless you have a high quality traffic. However, I believe that it’s still better than Advertlets. If things don’t improve with Advertlets, I’ll be staying away from it once I’ve reached RM100.
November 7th, 2007 at 8:35 pm
That is way better than Advertlets. I might be discarding Advertlets as well after I reached the RM100 pay out. My site is getting lesser and lesser Malaysian traffic and also, their CPM rate is getting lower and lower.
November 13th, 2007 at 3:23 am
For me I fill me blog with ads because it’s about experimentation. Also, I write about everything under the sun so it doesn’t really matter. I envy you that you can keep your layout so neat and tidy
November 13th, 2007 at 7:39 pm
Don’t envy me… I kept my earnings low and nice as well…
November 14th, 2007 at 10:47 am
I do my best to keep ads away from content.
Now i’m trying out adsense again (for the 3rd time or so). It’s always good to try out, just don’t do it at the expense of user experience.
November 18th, 2007 at 7:07 pm
@ goldfries
A few times a month?! You must have a very large numbers of Malaysian visitors. Do you mind revealing your CPM?