HELP PLEASE!!!! My Adsense CTR Rate is Pathetic. Anyone have some quality CTR Tips???

15 replies
  • SEO
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Edit: I have improved my CTR since writing this post. That being said, I have seen far more success with other methods. Ie. Amazon and Clickbank. Not sure if Adsense is ever the most lucrative monetization strategy. But from my experience, you can make far more money with other methods.

I keep hearing other people on the Warrior forum talking about getting insanely high CTR's. Even a more conservative warrior has claimed a 5% CTR average. Which is not even high in comparison to some of the big claims on here.

Things I've tried:

1. High CTR themes such as Clickbump and CTR Theme
2. Changing the ad colour to blend into the sites theme colour.
3. Trying about a million different templates
4. Testing on multiple different niches.
5. Placing ads above the fold

After testing for quite awhile and changing WP themes regularly, I am struggling to find a decent CTR. The traffic for my site(s) are actually pretty good. So I am making decent money. But if I was capable of a reasonable CTR, I'd be doing a lot better. This seems to be the one area of adsense publishing that I suck at.

Possible reasons I SUCK:

1. Niche's are not click happy

- I've thought about this. And for of my niches, this could be the case. But I have multiple niches with adsense and I highly doubt they are both this crappy.

2. Visitors have too much ad blindness.

- Not sure if the ads are just placed in a way that's easy to ignore perhaps.

Conclusion:

My CTR is terrible. I am currently using a Clickbump theme (xfactored 2.0) and am not seeing any CTR improvments. The theme has been great for SEO though. Any changes that I try and make have only decreased my CTR so far. I'm still looking for optimal position but feel like I'm missing something.

Does anyone have any advice or tips that have drastically improved their CTR.

PS. Of course, I don't have any adsense site available for you to look at. This is because I value my adsense account to highly. I really do not want to be banned from google for click bombing, or sharing private adsense information. But, as mentioned earlier, I am using the standard clickbump Xfactored 2.0 template. Perhaps some clickbump users have some tweaks that they don't mind sharing.
#adsense #ctr #pathetic #quality #rate #tips
  • Profile picture of the author markowe
    Have you tried Easy Adsense plugin? That, and probably some other similar plugins too, lets you automatically place ads after the first paragraph, before the last, etc. I mean, it's just another ad placement to try if you haven't already. It worked a treat on a site of mine. I suspect the niche does have something to do with it, plus if your content is half-decent then perhaps readers will click more once they have engaged with it a little.
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    • Profile picture of the author Brendan Mace
      Originally Posted by markowe View Post

      Have you tried Easy Adsense plugin? That, and probably some other similar plugins too, lets you automatically place ads after the first paragraph, before the last, etc. I mean, it's just another ad placement to try if you haven't already. It worked a treat on a site of mine. I suspect the niche does have something to do with it, plus if your content is half-decent then perhaps readers will click more once they have engaged with it a little.
      easy adsense plugin. Hmmmm... Thanks for the tips Mark. I'm going to check it out right now.
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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    What's the rest of the page look like, is the page heavy on distracting images?

    Does the exit links have Adsense on them?
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    • Profile picture of the author Brendan Mace
      Originally Posted by yukon View Post

      What's the rest of the page look like, is the page heavy on distracting images?

      Does the exit links have Adsense on them?
      I don't have too many distracting images. Tried to make the site as simple as possible. Yukon, is it possible for me to PM you my site? I would love to hear your input.
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  • Profile picture of the author James-
    The idea for a high CTR is that you want the ads to stand out, not blend in!

    Also give the user as little options as possible. If the ads are relevant they should be clicking them to get what they came to your site for.
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    • Profile picture of the author Brendan Mace
      Originally Posted by James- View Post

      The idea for a high CTR is that you want the ads to stand out, not blend in!

      Also give the user as little options as possible. If the ads are relevant they should be clicking them to get what they came to your site for.
      I hear what you're saying James. But using the same colours as my site theme was the one thing that increased CTR. When I visit I website, I automatically ignore anything that looks too much like an advertisement. The only time I click on ads, is when they don't trigger my ad filters.

      Of course, you can still tell that they are ads eventually. But, it's probably not effective to have them be in your face ads.

      For example, when I watch television and there's a commercial break, I switch the channel. However, if a television show advertised a product during the program (ie. product placement) I would be a lot more likely to be influenced.
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      • Profile picture of the author James-
        Originally Posted by co2 View Post

        When I visit I website, I automatically ignore anything that looks too much like an advertisement.
        This is all dependent on your niche. Persoanlly my target viewers are mostly women/ppl that are very untech savvy. They wouldn't know an ad if it smacked them in the face. So this is why i make them stand out.

        I have a lot of sites in the same niche, CTR varies quite greatly. I have on average 18% for some sites, and 2-5% for others. It may not be you, but the keywords you happen to go after.

        If you want me to take a look at your site, pm me and i'll see if i can help if you're interested.
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        • Profile picture of the author Brendan Mace
          Originally Posted by James- View Post

          This is all dependent on your niche. Persoanlly my target viewers are mostly women/ppl that are very untech savvy. They wouldn't know an ad if it smacked them in the face. So this is why i make them stand out.

          I have a lot of sites in the same niche, CTR varies quite greatly. I have on average 18% for some sites, and 2-5% for others. It may not be you, but the keywords you happen to go after.

          If you want me to take a look at your site, pm me and i'll see if i can help if you're interested.
          Thanks dude. I sent you a PM with details. I appreciate it!
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  • Profile picture of the author breex
    The awesome ads plug in will let you set up your ads with various sizes, fonts, colors to make testing. Might try that.it easy to do.
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    • Profile picture of the author stevo235
      Blending the colors into your site works well.
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  • Profile picture of the author nvs74191
    Are your ads that show up relevant to the niche? If not, work on your keyword density till you get it just right, and the ads showing up are relevant to your keyword.

    What I like to do is to look at this first, and once they are relevant, I look at the ads appearing to see what other keywords I could add to my content. Most of the time, you get an extra 3-4 keywords that adsense thinks is relevant, and I work them into my content and meta description.

    A high relevance to what the user searches for invariably draws the click. Of course have a clean page with no disctractions.

    I stumbled on this when I was working on my adwords arbitrage (it is not dead, I assure you), and once I optimized my content this way, my CTR doubled, increasing my profits.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mosa
    Take a look at what kind of ads are popping up on your site. If the ads that are popping up don't seem very relevant, then you may have some keywords that just don't convert into high CTR. I have a keyword that gets about 5% CTR and I also have one that gets 19% CTR on average. When I look at the ads that show up, it's clear why more people click ads on one site versus the other.
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  • Profile picture of the author DABK
    Take a look at this: The Ultimate Heatmap | FREE PDF Download. The CTR theme (not free) kind of works like that. I get 9-17% with that theme.

    The size of the ads matter (the 250x300 and the next size up work best for me), so does the 728x90.

    Where you place the ads matters but how the ads look also matters: image ads and ads with the link light grey, the text black or dark grey, work better for me... It seems that if they, the ads, look a lot like the rest of the text or are images, they get clicked through a lot.

    The articles matter. You can't say, click on the ads on this page, but you can get them excited or worried, i.e., in the mood to do more research (by clicking on ads). You can get them to think now, at long last, they've got all the info they need to act, so they click.

    One of mine is in the mortgage industry. I have posts about what makes FHA such a great program for 'people like you.' I have posts that cover who qualifies for an FHA mortgage. I have posts on how to tell a good mortgage broker from a bad one, posts on how some banks sell mortgages directly at higher interest rates than what you get if you get a mortgage from their wholesale division (through a mortgage broker).

    All of them are geared to make the reader understand better, have facts, real facts, so they can make informed decisions. All are written from a, I'm on your side/watch out for this and that perspective.

    And I actually care, which shows.

    Compare:
    FHA is a government program that allows homeowners with less then perfect credit scores or not enough down payment to get a mortgage loan. It does it by insuring the loans, thereby reducing the lender's risk.

    Currently, FHA insures only mortgages for primary residences. There are other requirements as well. You must make sure you understand all of them before getting an FHA mortgage.



    vs

    FHA is a government program that lets you buy your first home, or refinance it if you've already bought it, so you can take advantage of the low rates we've been having. You only need 3.5% down payment or equity. That's only $3,500 for a house worth $100,000. And you can do it even if your credit is on the bad side.

    Of course, just because you can do it doesn't mean you should. If your credit is really bad, you'll be better off spending the next few months raising it. A 60-point increase in scores can mean a few hundreds to a few thousands less each year in mortgage payments. And a 60-point increase can come from merely removing one inaccurate entry on one of the reports.
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  • Profile picture of the author Strange man
    hi everyone
    will i just Newbie in IM, but is it possible to get a lot of money from adsense and CTR and so one ??
    i mean money enough to quit fro your old job ??
    i don't think so >>>let say you have website 200page (woow) that is mean 200*3=600ads
    so if you get traffic 1000 day ((30000 in month good ))
    so CTR let say it is 50 %
    so you will get 500 click ((500* 0.15(Approximately )=75$ /day
    hahaha that really residual income
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  • Profile picture of the author Strange man
    hi every one


    I'm still newbie in IM but is it Possible to make residual income
    From adsense and ads ??
    will I don't think so

    Lets say that you have website 200page so that is 200*3=600ads
    And the traffic 1000 visitor ((30000 months good ))
    And the Conversion rate is 50%
    So you get 500click ((500*0.15(Approximately))=75$
    Hahaha That is really residual income
    So the bet why to make residual income is affiliate marketing
    Why
    1_because you don't have you come up with next big thing
    And here I talk about unIM niche (there so so so so many of why to make money online)) product could touch people live >> Increase mental ability Wight lose
    So let say that you prompt product like this
    70$per sell ........if sell 1000 that is 70000$
    70$per sell .........if sell 5000that is 350000$
    70per sell...........if sell 10000that is 700000$ woooooow
    so the idea is that the product is important that the system that been use to marketing the product
    and to do this you need
    1_good product ...so unique noting like it
    2_Enthusiasm About the product ...that is mean you use it
    3_ system to market the product
    that it ...so easy ha
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