Burning Questions For Google? We're Meeting A Google Rep For A One on One Apr 27th!

[TryBPO]

Wow...

So Google's AdSense team has a thing called "AdSense in your City" where they go from city to city and have meetings and sometimes 1 on 1 training and Q&A with various AdSense publishers. We were invited, RSVP'd, and have been accepted to a 1 on 1 with a Google Rep!

We're very excited about the opportunity and want to have a great list of questions to ask. We're going to ask a few questions about our account specifically, but we wanted to open it up a bit to have more questions asked from those of you here.

What we'd like is for you to respond with a question or two you'd like answered that can't be easily answered elsewhere. Here are some examples of what we're looking to ask.

1. Will smart pricing only affect the poorly converting site or is it based on AdSense accounts? Is there any plan in the future to share poorly converting data with us so that we can remove that AdSense and PROMOTE that which is performing for the advertisers...wouldn't that be end-user beneficial?

2. How do EMD AdSense sites do for conversion as a whole? Are they effective for your advertisers?

Can you think of any others you'd like to have answered. Feel free to chime in and we'll try to get them answered...

[dburk]

Hi Justin,

It is well known that smart pricing effects your entire account.

Conversion data is often not known to AdSense, it is only when an advertiser chooses to share that data does Google learn about conversion data. It would be nice information to know if there was some way to get it.

[TryBPO]

Originally Posted by dburk

Hi Justin,

It is well known that smart pricing effects your entire account.

Conversion data is often not known to AdSense, it is only when an advertiser chooses to share that data does Google learn about conversion data. It would be nice information to know if there was some way to get it.

I appreciate the comment, but I don't think that's true. If that is held, Google seems to say that it's a common myth.

Watch the video on this page from the Chief Economist at Google: Smart pricing: Can one website that is converting poorly affect other websites' earnings on the same account? - AdSense Help

Specifically, the part around 3:20 in when he starts talking about whether it's applied to an account or not.

The competing stream of thought is held here: One poorly converting site can “smart price” an entire AdSense account « JenSense

I tend to trust Google's argument on this. It wouldn't make sense for any of us to smart price an AdSense account, rather than a page targeting a specific niche. There are probably plenty of publishers that convert very well for customers in one niche and not so well for those in another.

[bigcat1967]

How in the world did you get an invitation???

[TryBPO]

Originally Posted by bigcat1967

How in the world did you get an invitation???

I know, right? We had a message in our AdSense account inviting us. At first, we thought it was everyone in the region, but maybe it's a random selection of accounts in the area? Anyway, we're pleased to be meeting with them...any specific questions you'd like answered?

[TryBPO]

Anyone else have any questions they'd like answered from Google directly about AdSense?

[MrWonton]

Speaking from experience, Google reps will very rarely reveal what you don't already know!!

[bfas]

Originally Posted by MrWonton

Speaking from experience, Google reps will very rarely reveal what you don't already know!!

That's been my experience as well.

I've met with both Adsense and Adwords reps; the unfortunate reality is, they probably know less than sophisticated users, and certainly aren't going to 'reveal' anything that isn't generally known.

Where I found it most helpful is just having that name and email that I could go to for clarifications, problem escalation, etc.

Michael

[TryBPO]

Well that's disappointing to hear! Hopefully we'll get something better than that...will let you know how it goes.

[Oranges]

Ask them that they periodically ban many innocent publishers for various reasons.
Is it done by a random bot? or manually?

[TryBPO]

I will ask them about "banning" and voice some of the concerns we've read and had ourselves...

[MrWonton]

Originally Posted by bfas

Where I found it most helpful is just having that name and email that I could go to for clarifications, problem escalation, etc.

Agreed, having a point of contact can be very useful.

Good luck with the meeting TryBPO, hope you get some useful info

[TryBPO]

So my business partner had the meeting and we had a quick phone call right after to go over a few points. I shared this in another thread, but thought I would follow up here since this is where I mentioned it. Nothing groundbreaking, but it verifies some things from the horse's mouth, so to speak:

So I just got off the phone with my business partner who just finished lunch after meeting with the Google AdSense rep and here are a few highlights from that meeting.

- We were actually invited to this meeting...I thought it was sent to everyone in the area and those that replied got in...nice!
- They want people that are creating sites...not MFA sites. Our sites, although boring, are not considered MFA.
- You MUST have 100% unique content. (We do) Do not duplicate content from elsewhere, use auto-blogs, etc.
- They really do manual reviews...but manual reviewers do NOT have the authority to shut down AdSense accounts...ours would be fine as-is.
- Contrary to popular belief, they do not shut down AdSense accounts on a whim, unless something REALLY bad is going on with the account. They will give any reasonable publishers fair warning on what needs to be corrected.
- We messed up (and are a little stupid) by simply using the code provided from our WP templates and not matching them to our AdSense account ads. Therefore, Google doesn't know which blocks/ads are performing better and have not been able to optimize for our sites. Very stupid, rookie mistake on our part and (wink wink, nudge nudge) she told us we might do much better by fixing that.
- Good luck getting an "actual" account rep...reserved for top .00001% of publishers. (Think New York Times level)
- 250x300 and skypscraper blocks are generally used by the premium advertisers.
- (In our particular case) We're better off going with 2 blocks and a link unit, rather than 3 blocks and a link unit. (250x300, skyscraper, and linkunit)
- Although we have personal AdSense accounts and a business AdSense account...don't bother mixing/matching there at all. Although it's acceptable to have those accounts, you might throw up some flags there...better to be avoided... (We asked about this as it would allow us to track more URL channels)
- Some major publishers have tested wrapping text vs. not wrapping and not wrapping generally has won out.
- Our tactic (And xFactor and others) of putting the ad block right below the title is aggressive, but acceptable. Putting something like "Click Here", "Hot Deals Today" etc. would be going too far.
- AdWords targets heavily by whether you're logged into your Google account or not. If logged in, it will try to show ads that are good for YOU and not as heavily based on content. (Shoe ads on a funeral site, for example) If not logged in, the weight goes to the content.
- Very helpful, knowledgeable, and friendly

What a cool experience! I only got to talk to my partner for a short period of time, but we have some things that we think might greatly improve our income and are anxious to test them out.

Thoughts?

[dp40oz]

You MUST have 100% original content? So putting articles that are relevant to your site on your page is against adsense? Thats a bit ridiculous. Does Google not understand that if I have a webpage about golf and someone else wrote a good article about helping your golf swing, then that article would be extremely helpful and relevant to my readers.

[Cantbedone!]

Originally Posted by dp40oz

You MUST have 100% original content? So putting articles that are relevant to your site on your page is against adsense? Thats a bit ridiculous. Does Google not understand that if I have a webpage about golf and someone else wrote a good article about helping your golf swing, then that article would be extremely helpful and relevant to my readers.

Yeah, thats kinda strange considering all of the "news" sites that Ive seen running adsense with the same articles that exist all over the net. It also would mean that anyone who syndicates articles from article directories for their websites would be ineligible to participate in the program.

Article directory sites themselves use adsense on articles that are submitted to them by users who also submit those same articles all over the place on the web. I mean, I guess I understand it but it seems to contradict what we've all seen so it's still a little confusing.

It would rule out PLR as well unless the articles are totally rewritten.