Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Google earning tips.


  1. Follow Google AdSense Terms and Conditions. This is their game. Play by their rule. If in doubt, ask.

  2. High traffic is important. Search Engine Optimization helps achieve this.

  3. Content is king. Update your website regularly. Create fresh contents everyday.

  4. Give reasons for your visitor to come to your site. Provide values.

  5. Some subtle changes on your site can double or triple your earning.

  6. Never stop experimenting.

  7. AdSense is not the only game in town. Try other networks. You may find that others are better suited for your website.

  8. Never stop learning.

  9. Don’t give up.


10.Don’t use click-bots.

11.Don’t encourage your visitors to click on ads. The only acceptable text is “Sponsored Links” and “Advertisements”.


12. Don’t put competitor contextual ads on the same page as your AdSense, for example: Yahoo Publisher Network, Clicksor. Non-contextual ads are ok.


13.Don’t put your ads on objectionable material, e.g. adult sites, gambling sites, mp3, etc.


14. Basically, don’t cheat AdSense. Google will catch you, sooner or later.


15. Viewing your on website will not get you banned. Just make sure you don’t click on the ads.


16.However, repeatedly reload your page to jack up page impressions can get you banned.


17.When in doubt don’t hesitate to contact the AdSense team. They are very helpful.


18.Choose a high paying niche without too much competition.


19.You can try highest paying keywords from cwire.org, but know before-hand that you’ll face very fierce competitions.


20.Use Overture Bid Tool and Search Engine Keyword Tool to find suitable keyword.

21.

Consider signing-up for AdWords and create a mini campaign. It can help you to understand the working of AdSense.

Target a specific audience. Get Google AdWords.
22.

Put your targeted-keyword on Page Title.
23.

Repeat the keywords in your content.
24.

Learn HTML.
25.

Put emphasis around your keywords by using HTML tags like

,

, , , e.g. AdSense Tips .
26.

Get domain name that contains your targeted keyword.
27.

Submit your website to directories for inclusion, e.g. dmoz.org, yahoo directories
28.

Submit your URL to search engines for crawling.
29.

Create and submit your sitemaps to Google Sitemap (sitemap.xml) and Yahoo (urllist.txt)
30.

Google is not the only search engine. Optimize for different engines as well. You are very likely to face less competition than in Google.
31.

Invest for original fresh content. Write or pay for contents regularly.
32.

Use copyscape.com to find content theft. You invest for your content. Don’t let it be taken by unscrupulous webmasters.
33.

Article marketing is one of the best way to deliver traffic to your site. Write and submit articles to article-submission sites. Include short summary and hyperlinks to your website in the author information box.
34.

Don’t use objectionable methods to draw visitors to your site; buying traffics, spyware, hidden-texts, page cloaking etc will get your AdSense account terminated.
35.

New visitors have higher chance to click on the ads than regular visitors, thus higher CTR (click-through rate).
36.

Regular visitors have higher chance to recommend your site to others.
37.

Search engines are where most of your new visitors come from. Learn a bit about Search Engine Optimization, or pay people to do it. Doing it yourself will save yourself from troubles created by not-so-honorable SEO (Search Engine Optimizer).
38.

Don’t create mirrors. These are sites with different URLs but same contents. It hurts search engine ranking.
39.

Its easier to create many websites with low earning than few websites with high earning.
40.

Forum generally have high impressions count, but very low CTR.

41.

CTR isn’t everything. If your CTR is high but gives low conversion rate for the advertiser site, it will trigger AdSense smart pricing.
42.

Follow good design guidelines. Avoid the common design mistakes.
43.

Help your visitors by creating easy navigation. You want your visitors to stay for as long as possible.
44.

Use Google Analytics to see your website statistics. It can help you optimize your site.
45.

Google AdSense Heatmap works. Just above your main content is the best position to put your AdSense block
46.

Forum sites have different Forum AdSense Heatmap. Best positions for AdSense for forums are: on the left panel, after the first post, and just below the last post before the footer.
47.

Forum is interactive medium. Be sensitive to your visitors concerns.
48.

Try 300×250 medium rectangle, 336×280 large rectangle, or 160×600 wide skyscraper ad formats. These are the best performing AdSense ad formats.
49.

Choose colors that blend with your content.
50.

Wrap the AdSense block around your content.
51.

Put images next to or above your AdSense block can help improve your clicks-rate.
Edit: take note, however, to make it clear that the images are not part of the ads. If not sure, consult AdSense support before doing this.
52.

Use channels to track the performance of different format, colors, and positions.
53.

Opt in for both image ads and text ads. Google will choose better performing ads for you.
54.

AdSense have both CPM (cost per thousand impressions) and CPC (cost per click) ads, and will choose the one it thinks can perform better.
55.

Both image ads and text ads can be either CPM or CPC.
56.

Put link unit ads. They can add to the bottom line.
57.

Try Google Search unit. They provide value to your visitor while adding to your bottom line.
58.

Put in lots of efforts in creating contents and promoting your website. AdSense is not a get-rich-quick scheme.
59.

Clear low-value links from your site. You want your visitors to exit through the ads. Put only links that are really useful for the visitors.
60.

Search “AdSense Tips” on Google. Most webmasters continuously try to optimize their AdSense and many are more than willing to share their result.




61.

If you blog, Darren has some tips for you.
62.

Inside AdSense is official AdSense blog, where you can find latest developments about AdSense.
63.

You can get help of other AdSense pulishers at AdSense Help Group.
64.

If you are serious about making money from AdSense, get Joel’s AdSense Secrets.
65.

Don’t put too many ad blocks on your site. Find out the highest CTR block and remove the others. Few clicks on the 1$ ads are better than many clicks on the 3-cent-ads.
66.

Experiment, experiment, and experiment. You can never stop trying for new ad format. Even if you think you can’t improve anymore, one slight change might increase your earning significantly.
67.

Remove the “Advertise on this site” from your AdSense block until your site is big enough to attract real advertisers. This will help to clear off many MFA (made-for-adsense) sites. You can disable it from AdSense account setting.
68.

Use AdSense Preview Tool to test the ads that will appear on your site. You can click on ads in the AdSense preview tool, as the advertisers are not charged from it.
69.

AdSense uses geo-location to deliver advertisement. So, what you see on your site might not be what your visitors see. Use AdSense Preview Tool to view your AdSense advertisement displayed for visitors from other places.
70.

Use AdSense Competitive Ads Filter to remove scrapper sites ads. Scrapper sites are sites without real content. They are either link farms, content theft, or meta search engine.
71.

Use AdSense Competitive Ads Filter to remove irrelevant ads.
72.

AdsBlackList.com have good list of URLs to block. Try it.
73.

Try variations of AdSense colors, format, position on different pages to make it more unpredictable for your visitors.
74.

Learn some CSS.
75.

If you are putting multiple ads block on your website: put most clicked block to appear first in the HTML. Higher position in HTML = higher paying ads. You can do this using CSS.
76.

Try to put contents on different subject topics. If it can draw visitors, write more on that topic.
77.

If you have dynamic pages, use htaccess rewrite rule to make it appear as static
78.

Validate your site HTML and CSS.
79.

Break your long articles to few short articles; this way the users are exposed to the ads for more times.
80.

Keep each article focused on one topic.

Saturday, July 5, 2008

Google AdSenseTM Online Standard Terms and Conditions


PLEASE READ VERY CAREFULLY THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND THE FAQ BEFORE REGISTERING FOR THE GOOGLE ADSENSE ONLINE PROGRAM. PARTICIPATION IN THE GOOGLE ADSENSE ONLINE PROGRAM INDICATES THAT YOU ACCEPT THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS. IF YOU DO NOT ACCEPT THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS, PLEASE DO NOT REGISTER FOR OR PARTICIPATE IN THE GOOGLE ADSENSE ONLINE PROGRAM.





Introduction. This agreement ("Agreement") between You and Google Inc. ("Google") consists of these Google AdSense Online Program (the "Program") Standard Terms and Conditions ("Terms and Conditions"). A description of the Program, as generally offered by Google, is available at the Program Frequently Asked Questions ("FAQ") URL, located at https://www.google.com/adsense/faq, or such other URL as Google may provide from time to time. "You" or "Publisher" means any entity identified in an enrollment form submitted by the same or affiliated persons, and/or any agency or network acting on its (or their) behalf, which shall also be bound by the terms of this Agreement.



1. Program Participation. Participation in the Program is subject to Google’s prior approval and Your continued compliance with the Program Policies ("Program Policies"), located at https://www.google.com/adsense/policies, and/or such other URL as Google may provide from time to time. Google reserves the right to refuse participation to any applicant or participant at any time in its sole discretion. By enrolling in the Program, You represent that You are at least 18 years of age and agree that Google may serve (a) third party and/or Google provided advertisements and/or other content (such third party provided advertisements, Google provided advertisements and other content, collectively, "Ads"), provided, however, that if Google serves non-compensated content, You will have the ability to opt out of receiving such content as part of the Program, (b) related Google queries and/or Ad search box(es) (collectively, “Links”), (c) Google Web and/or Site search results (collectively, "Search Results"), and/or (d) Google referral Ads (“Referral Buttons”), each in connection with the Web site(s), media player(s), video content and/or mobile content that You designate, or such other properties expressly authorized in writing by Google (including by electronic mail) (such other properties, “Other Properties”), and the Atom, RSS, or other feeds distributed through such Web site(s) , media player(s), video content, mobile content and/or Other Properties (each such Web site, media player, video content, mobile content, Other Property or feed, a "Property"). For the avoidance of doubt, any reference in this Agreement or the Program Policies to an individual “Web page”, “Web site”, “Web site page” or the like that is part of the Property will also mean feeds and media players distributed through such Web site. Multiple accounts held by the same individual or entity are subject to immediate termination unless expressly authorized in writing by Google (including by electronic mail). In some circumstances expressly authorized in writing by Google (including by electronic mail), You may enroll in the Program and create an account for the sole purpose of receiving payment from Google, and not, for purposes of clarification, for the purpose of displaying Ads, Links, Search Results and/or Referral Buttons on a Property. If, however, You subsequently use your Account to participate in the Program (i.e. for the purpose of displaying Ads, Links, Search Results and/or Referral Buttons on a Property), then such use of the Program will be governed by the terms of this Agreement. You must have and abide by an appropriate privacy policy that clearly discloses that third parties may be placing and reading cookies on your users’ browser, or using web beacons to collect information, in the course of ads being served on your website. Your privacy policy should also include information about user options for cookie management.



2. Implementation and Operation of Ads, Search Results, and Referrals. You agree to comply with the specifications provided by Google from time to time to enable proper delivery, display, tracking, and reporting of Ads, Links, Search Results, Referral Buttons, and Google Brand Features (as defined in Section 12 below) in connection with Your Property(ies), including without limitation by not modifying the JavaScript or other programming provided to You by Google in any way, unless expressly authorized in writing by Google (including by electronic mail).
o AdSense for Search. If You have elected to receive Search Results, You will display on Your Property(ies) a Google search box (a "Search Box") in accordance with the specifications provided by Google. Except for related Google queries, all search queries (including queries entered into an Ad search box) must originate from individual human end users inputting data directly into a Search Box (or Ad search box, as applicable) on Your Property(ies). You will send any and all queries (without editing, filtering, truncating, appending terms to or otherwise modifying such queries individually or in the aggregate) to Google and Google will use commercially reasonable efforts to provide You with corresponding Search Results and/or Ads, as applicable and as available. Search Results and any accompanying Ads will be displayed on Web pages that may be hosted by Google (each, a "Search Results Page"), and the format, look and feel of those Web pages hosted by Google may be modified by Google from time to time.
o AdSense for Content. All content and Property-based Ads (and Ads served in response to end user clicks on and queries entered into Links, if any) shall be grouped by Google and displayed with Links (where applicable) to end users of the Property(ies) as ad units (such groups of Ads and/or Links collectively referred to as "Ad Units") in standard formats as offered generally by Google from time to time, as may be described in the FAQ. You may select a format approved by Google for the display of Ad Units in connection with the Property(ies), but You acknowledge and agree that Ads and/or Links: (i) shall only be displayed in connection with the Property(ies), each of which is subject to review and approval by Google in its discretion at any time; and (ii) shall be subject to the placement guidelines set forth herein.
o Referrals. If You have elected to use the Google AdSense Referrals feature, You will implement any Referral Buttons on Your Property(ies) in accordance with the specifications provided by Google. End users who click on a Referral Button will be directed to a Web page that may be hosted by Google (“Referral Page”), and the format, look and feel of those Web pages hosted by Google may be modified by Google from time to time. A “Referral Event” will be initiated when an end user clicks on a Referral Button from the Property and will be completed when the referral requirements for the relevant product are satisfied in accordance with this Agreement. Such referral requirements, along with the payment amount applicable to the Referral Event, are located at https://www.google.com/adsense/referrals, or such other URL as Google may provide from time to time. You agree to comply with the specifications provided by Google from time to time to enable proper tracking and reporting of Referral Events in connection with Your Property. You shall not promote or facilitate a Referral Event by any means other than displaying a Referral Button on the Property, unless expressly authorized in writing by Google (including by electronic mail).
o AdSense for Video. If you have elected to use AdSense for Video, Your participation is subject to your continued compliance with the AdSense for Video Program policies located at http://adsense.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=73987 or the URL as Google may provide from time to time. All Ads (including Ads served in response to end user clicks on and queries entered into Links, if any) shall be (1) grouped by Google and displayed with Links (where applicable) to end users of the Property(ies) as Ad Unit(s) or (2) pre-, post- or interstitial roll in connection with third party video content, in each case in standard formats as offered generally by Google from time to time, as may be further described in the applicable policies. You acknowledge and agree that the Ads will be displayed on the Property in a video format approved by Google, and that such Ads: (i) shall only be displayed in connection with the Property(ies) and non-advertisement video content (collectively “Video Media”), all of which is subject to review and approval by Google in its discretion at any time; and (ii) shall only be requested in connection with end user initiated Video Media. In addition, You agree that You may only display one (1) Ad Unit within Your media player at any single time, unless otherwise approved by Google in writing.
o General; Serviced Pages; Filtering; Beta Features. You agree not to display on the same Web page in connection with which any Ad Unit, Ad, Link, Search Box, or Referral Button is displayed (a "Serviced Page") any advertisement(s) or content that an end user of Your Property(ies) would reasonably confuse with a Google advertisement or otherwise associate with Google. Certain Google services available as part of the Program may contain filtering capability, such as SafeSearch or AdSafe, that You may access through Your account. However, if You elect to enable any such filters, You acknowledge and agree that: (i) it is Your responsibility to enable such features in accordance with the specifications provided by Google, and (ii) Google does not and cannot commit that all results (including Ads, Links and Search Results) will be limited to results elected by enabling such filter(s). Some Program features are identified as “Beta” or otherwise unsupported (“Beta Features”). To the fullest extent permitted by law, Beta Features are provided "as is" and at Your option and risk. You shall not disclose to any third party any information from Beta Features, existence of non-public Beta Features or access to Beta Features. .




3. Communications Solely With Google. You agree to direct to Google, and not to any advertiser, any communication regarding any Ad(s) or Link(s) displayed in connection with Your Property(ies).



4. Parties' Responsibilities. You are solely responsible for the Property(ies), including all content and materials, maintenance and operation thereof, the proper implementation of Google's specifications, and adherence to the terms of this Agreement, including compliance with the Program Policies. Google reserves the right to investigate, at its own discretion, any activity that may violate this Agreement, including but not limited to any use of a software application to access Ads, Links, Search Results, or Referral Buttons or to complete any Referral Event, or any engagement in any activity prohibited by this Agreement. Google is not responsible for anything related to Your Property(ies), including without limitation the receipt of queries from end users of Your Property(ies) or the transmission of data between Your Property(ies) and Google. In addition, Google shall not be obligated to provide notice to You in the event that any Ad, Link, Search Result, or Referral Button is not being displayed properly to, or Referral Event is not being completed properly by, end users of the Property(ies).



5. Prohibited Uses. You shall not, and shall not authorize or encourage any third party to: (i) directly or indirectly generate queries, Referral Events, or impressions of or clicks on any Ad, Link, Search Result, or Referral Button (including without limitation by clicking on “play” for any video Ad) through any automated, deceptive, fraudulent or other invalid means, including but not limited to through repeated manual clicks, the use of robots or other automated query tools and/or computer generated search requests, and/or the unauthorized use of other search engine optimization services and/or software; (ii) edit, modify, filter, truncate or change the order of the information contained in any Ad, Link, Ad Unit, Search Result, or Referral Button, or remove, obscure or minimize any Ad, Link, Ad Unit, Search Result, or Referral Button in any way without authorization from Google; (iii) frame, minimize, remove or otherwise inhibit the full and complete display of any Web page accessed by an end user after clicking on any part of an Ad ("Advertiser Page"), any Search Results Page, or any Referral Page; (iv) redirect an end user away from any Advertiser Page, Search Results Page, or Referral Page; provide a version of the Advertiser Page, Search Results Page, or Referral Page that is different from the page an end user would access by going directly to the Advertiser Page, Search Results Page, or Referral Page; intersperse any content between the Ad and the Advertiser Page, between the page containing the Search Box and the Search Results Page, or between the Referral Button and the Referral Page; or otherwise provide anything other than a direct link from an Ad to an Advertiser Page, from the page containing the Search Box to the Search Results Page, or from the Referral Button to the Referral Page; (v) display any Ad(s), Link(s), or Referral Button(s) on any Web page or any Web site that contains any pornographic, hate-related, violent, or illegal content; (vi) directly or indirectly access, launch, and/or activate Ads, Links, Search Results, or Referral Buttons through or from, or otherwise incorporate the Ads, Links, Search Results, or Referral Buttons in, any software application, Web site, or other means other than Your Property(ies), and then only to the extent expressly permitted by this Agreement; (vii) "crawl", "spider", index or in any non-transitory manner store or cache information obtained from any Ads, Links, Search Results, or Referral Events, or any part, copy, or derivative thereto; (viii) act in any way that violates any Program Policies posted on the Google Web Site, as may be revised from time to time, or any other agreement between You and Google (including without limitation the Google AdWords program terms); (ix) disseminate malware; (x) create a new account to use the Program after Google has terminated this Agreement with You as a result of your breach of this Agreement; or (xi) engage in any action or practice that reflects poorly on Google or otherwise disparages or devalues Google’s reputation or goodwill. You acknowledge that any attempted participation or violation of any of the foregoing is a material breach of this Agreement and that we may pursue any and all applicable legal and equitable remedies against You, including an immediate suspension of Your account or termination of this Agreement, and the pursuit of all available civil or criminal remedies.




6. Termination; Cancellation. Subject to any third party agreements You may have with other Google customers (e.g., Your Web hosting company), You may stop displaying Ads, Links, Search Boxes, or Referral Buttons on any Property in the Program with or without cause at any time by removing the Google JavaScript or similar programming from Your Properties. You may terminate this Agreement with or without cause at any time by sending written notice of your desire to cancel Your participation in the Program to adsense-support@google.com. This Agreement will be deemed terminated within ten (10) business days of Google's receipt of Your notice. Google may investigate any activity that may violate this Agreement. Google may at any time, in its sole discretion, terminate all or part of the Program, terminate this Agreement, or suspend or terminate the participation of any Property in all or part of the Program for any reason. In addition, Google reserves the right to terminate without notice any account that has not generated a sufficient number of valid clicks on Ads or Referral Buttons or valid impressions of Ads (in each case as measured by Google) for a period of two (2) months or more. Upon termination of participation of any Property in the Program or termination of this Agreement for any reason, Sections 3, 6 through 10, and 14 through 17 shall survive termination.




7. Confidentiality. You agree not to disclose Google Confidential Information without Google's prior written consent. "Google Confidential Information" includes without limitation: (a) all Google software, technology, programming, specifications, materials, guidelines and documentation relating to the Program; (b) click-through rates or other statistics relating to Property performance in the Program provided to You by Google; and (c) any other information designated in writing by Google as "Confidential" or an equivalent designation. However, You may accurately disclose the amount of Google’s gross payments to You pursuant to the Program. Google Confidential Information does not include information that has become publicly known through no breach by You or Google, or information that has been (i) independently developed without access to Google Confidential Information, as evidenced in writing; (ii) rightfully received by You from a third party; or (iii) required to be disclosed by law or by a governmental authority.




8. No Guarantee. Google makes no guarantee regarding the level of impressions of Ads or clicks on any Ad or Referral Button, the timing of delivery of such impressions and/or clicks, the completion of Referral Events, or the amount of any payment to be made to You under this Agreement. In addition, for the avoidance of doubt, Google does not guarantee the Program will be operable at all times or during any down time (i) caused by outages to any public Internet backbones, networks or servers, (ii) caused by any failures of Your equipment, systems or local access services, (iii) for previously scheduled maintenance or (iv) relating to events beyond Google’s (or its wholly owned subsidiaries’) control such as strikes, riots, insurrection, fires, floods, explosions, war, governmental action, labor conditions, earthquakes, natural disasters, or interruptions in Internet services to an area where Google (or its wholly owned subsidiaries) or Your servers are located or co-located.




9. No Warranty. GOOGLE MAKES NO WARRANTY, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION WITH RESPECT TO ADVERTISING, LINKS, SEARCH, REFERRALS, AND OTHER SERVICES, AND EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS THE WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF NONINFRINGEMENT, MERCHANTABILITY, AND FITNESS FOR ANY PARTICULAR PURPOSE. TO THE EXTENT ADS, LINKS, AND SEARCH RESULTS ARE BASED ON OR DISPLAYED IN CONNECTION WITH NON-GOOGLE CONTENT, GOOGLE SHALL NOT HAVE ANY LIABILITY IN CONNECTION WITH THE DISPLAY OF SUCH ADS, LINKS, AND SEARCH RESULTS.




10. Limitations of Liability; Force Majeure. EXCEPT FOR ANY INDEMNIFICATION AND CONFIDENTIALITY OBLIGATIONS HEREUNDER OR YOUR BREACH OF ANY INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS AND/OR PROPRIETARY INTERESTS RELATING TO THE PROGRAM, (i) IN NO EVENT SHALL EITHER PARTY BE LIABLE UNDER THIS AGREEMENT FOR ANY CONSEQUENTIAL, SPECIAL, INDIRECT, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES WHETHER IN CONTRACT, TORT OR ANY OTHER LEGAL THEORY, EVEN IF SUCH PARTY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES AND NOTWITHSTANDING ANY FAILURE OF ESSENTIAL PURPOSE OF ANY LIMITED REMEDY AND (ii) GOOGLE'S AGGREGATE LIABILITY TO PUBLISHER UNDER THIS AGREEMENT FOR ANY CLAIM IS LIMITED TO THE NET AMOUNT PAID BY GOOGLE TO PUBLISHER DURING THE THREE MONTH PERIOD IMMEDIATELY PRECEDING THE DATE OF THE CLAIM. Each party acknowledges that the other party has entered into this Agreement relying on the limitations of liability stated herein and that those limitations are an essential basis of the bargain between the parties. Without limiting the foregoing and except for payment obligations, neither party shall have any liability for any failure or delay resulting from any condition beyond the reasonable control of such party, including but not limited to governmental action or acts of terrorism, earthquake or other acts of God, labor conditions, and power failures.




11. Payment. You shall receive a payment related to the number of valid clicks on Ads, the number of valid impressions of Ads, the number of valid completions of Referral Events initiated through Referral Buttons displayed in connection with Your Property(ies), and/or other events performed in connection with the display of Ads on Your Property(ies), in each case as determined by Google for its participants in the Program. If You have elected to receive Search Results, this payment will be offset by fees applicable to Search Results. Unless otherwise agreed to by the parties in writing (including by electronic mail), payments to You shall be sent by Google within approximately thirty (30) days after the end of each calendar month that Ads or Referral Buttons are running on Your Property or that Ads are running on Search Results Pages if Your earned balance is $100 or more. In the event the Agreement is terminated, Google shall pay Your earned balance to You within approximately ninety (90) days after the end of the calendar month in which the Agreement is terminated by You (following Google's receipt of Your written request, including by email, to terminate the Agreement) or by Google. In no event, however, shall Google make payments for any earned balance less than $10. Notwithstanding the foregoing, Google shall not be liable for any payment based on: (a) any amounts which result from invalid queries, invalid Referral Events, or invalid clicks or impressions on Ads generated by any person, bot, automated program or similar device, as reasonably determined by Google, including without limitation through any clicks or impressions (i) originating from Your IP addresses or computers under Your control, (ii) solicited by payment of money, false representation, or request for end users to click on Ads, or (iii) solicited by payment of money, false representation, or any illegal or otherwise invalid request for end users to complete Referral Events; (b) Ads or Referral Buttons delivered to end users whose browsers have JavaScript disabled; (c) Ads benefiting charitable organizations and other placeholder or transparent Ads that Google may deliver; or (d) clicks co-mingled with a significant number of invalid clicks described in (a) above, or as a result of any breach of this Agreement by You for any applicable pay period. Google reserves the right to withhold payment or charge back Your account due to any of the foregoing or any breach of this Agreement by You, pending Google's reasonable investigation of any of the foregoing or any breach of this Agreement by You, or in the event that an advertiser whose Ads are displayed in connection with Your Property(ies) defaults on payment for such Ads to Google. In addition, if You are past due on any payment to Google in connection with any Google program (including without limitation the Google AdWords program), Google reserves the right to withhold payment until all outstanding payments have been made or to offset amounts owed to You in connection with the Program by amounts owed by You to Google. To ensure proper payment, You are solely responsible for providing and maintaining accurate address and other contact information as well as payment information associated with Your account. For U.S. taxpayers, this information includes without limitation a valid U.S. tax identification number and a fully-completed Form W-9. For non-U.S. taxpayers, this information includes without limitation either a signed certification that the taxpayer does not have U.S. Activities (as described on the Google AdSense: Tax Information Page located at https://www.google.com/adsense/taxinfo, or such other URL as Google may provide from time to time) or a fully-completed Form W-8 or other form, which may require a valid U.S. tax identification number, as required by the U.S. tax authorities. Any bank fees related to returned or cancelled checks due to a contact or payment information error or omission may be deducted from the newly issued payment. You agree to pay all applicable taxes or charges imposed by any government entity in connection with Your participation in the Program. Google may change its pricing and/or payment structure at any time. If You dispute any payment made under the Program, You must notify Google in writing within thirty (30) days of any such payment; failure to so notify Google shall result in the waiver by You of any claim relating to any such disputed payment. Payment shall be calculated solely based on records maintained by Google. No other measurements or statistics of any kind shall be accepted by Google or have any effect under this Agreement. The payments made under this Agreement are for use by You only and may not be transferred or in any manner passed on to any third party (i.e., distributed to Properties managed by You that require separate payments) unless expressly authorized in writing by Google (including by electronic mail). From time to time Google may be holding funds, payments and other amounts due to You in connection with the AdSense Program. You acknowledge and agree that Google may, without further notice to You, contribute to a charitable organization selected by Google all funds, payments and other amounts related to the AdSense Program that are held by Google and that are due to you (if any), but which Google is unable to pay or deliver to You because Your account is Inactive (as defined below). “Inactive” means that, based on Google’s records: (a) for a period of two (2) years or more You have not logged into your account or accepted funds, payments or other amounts that Google has attempted to pay or deliver to You, and (b) Google has been unable to reach You, or has not received adequate payment instructions from You, after contacting You at the address shown in Google’s records.




12. Publicity. You agree that Google may use Your name and logo in presentations, marketing materials, customer lists, financial reports, Web site listings of customers, Search Results Pages, and Referral Pages. If You wish to use Google's trade names, trademarks, service marks, logos, domain names, and other distinctive brand features ("Brand Features"), You may do so, so long as such use is in compliance with this Agreement and in compliance with Google's then current Brand Feature use guidelines, and any content contained or referenced therein, which guidelines may be found at the following URL: http://www.google.com/permissions/guidelines.html (or such other URL Google may provide from time to time).




13. Representations and Warranties. You represent and warrant that (a) all of the information provided by You to Google to enroll in the Program is correct and current; (b) You are the owner of each Property or You are legally authorized to act on behalf of the owner of such Property(ies) for the purposes of this Agreement and the Program; (c) You have all necessary right, power, and authority to enter into this Agreement and to perform the acts required of You hereunder; and (d) You have complied and will continue to comply with all applicable laws, statutes, ordinances, and regulations (including without limitation the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 and any relevant data protection or privacy laws) in Your performance of any acts hereunder. In addition, to the extent that Your Site is a media player (1) You represent and warrant that You have a valid license to use and distribute such media player (including all content therein, including without limitation any Ads or Ad Units) for the purposes of this Agreement and the Program; and (2) You shall ensure that any media player(s) that constitute the Site shall comply with the terms and conditions set forth herein. You further represent and warrant that each Property and any material displayed therein: (i) comply with all applicable laws, statutes, ordinances, and regulations; (ii) do not breach and have not breached any duty toward or rights of any person or entity including, without limitation, rights of intellectual property, publicity or privacy, or rights or duties under consumer protection, product liability, tort, or contract theories; and (iii) are not pornographic, hate-related or otherwise violent in content.




14. Your Obligation to Indemnify. You agree to indemnify, defend and hold Google, its agents, affiliates, subsidiaries, directors, officers, employees, and applicable third parties (e.g. relevant advertisers, syndication partners, licensors, licensees, consultants and contractors) (collectively "Indemnified Person(s)") harmless from and against any and all third party claims, liability, loss, and expense (including damage awards, settlement amounts, and reasonable legal fees), brought against any Indemnified Person(s), arising out of, related to or which may arise from Your use of the Program, the Property(ies), and/or Your breach of any term of this Agreement.




15. Google Rights. You acknowledge that Google owns all right, title and interest, including without limitation all Intellectual Property Rights (as defined below), in and to the Program (including Google's ad serving technology, search technology, referral technology, and Brand Features, including implied licenses, and excluding items licensed by Google from third parties and excluding any third party media player that may comprise the Property), and that You will not acquire any right, title, or interest in or to the Program except as expressly set forth in this Agreement. You will not modify, adapt, translate, prepare derivative works from, decompile, reverse engineer, disassemble or otherwise attempt to derive source code from any Google services, software, or documentation, or create or attempt to create a substitute or similar service or product through use of or access to the Program or proprietary information related thereto. You will not remove, obscure, or alter Google's copyright notice, Brand Features, or other proprietary rights notices affixed to or contained within any Google services, software, or documentation (including without limitation the display of Google’s Brand Features with Ads, Links, Search Boxes, Search Results, and/or Referral Buttons, as applicable). "Intellectual Property Rights" means any and all rights existing from time to time under patent law, copyright law, semiconductor chip protection law, moral rights law, trade secret law, trademark law, unfair competition law, publicity rights law, privacy rights law, and any and all other proprietary rights, as well as, any and all applications, renewals, extensions, restorations and re-instatements thereof, now or hereafter in force and effect worldwide.




16. Information Rights. Google may retain and use, subject to the terms of the Google Privacy Policy (located at http://www.google.com/privacy.html, or such other URL as Google may provide from time to time), all information You provide, including but not limited to Property demographics and contact and billing information. You agree that Google may transfer and disclose to third parties personally identifiable information about You for the purpose of approving and enabling Your participation in the Program, including to third parties that reside in jurisdictions with less restrictive data laws than Your own. Google may also provide information in response to valid legal process, such as subpoenas, search warrants and court orders, or to establish or exercise its legal rights or defend against legal claims. Google disclaims all responsibility, and will not be liable to You, however, for any disclosure of that information by any such third party. Google may share non-personally-identifiable information about You, including Property URLs, Property-specific statistics and similar information collected by Google, with advertisers, business partners, sponsors, and other third parties. In addition, You grant Google the right to access, index and cache the Property(ies), or any portion thereof, including by automated means including Web spiders or crawlers.



17. Miscellaneous. This Agreement shall be governed by the laws of California, except for its conflicts of laws principles. Any dispute or claim arising out of or in connection with this Agreement shall be adjudicated in Santa Clara County, California. The parties specifically exclude from application to the Agreement the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods and the Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act. This Agreement constitutes the entire agreement between the parties with respect to the subject matter hereof. Any modifications to this Agreement must be made in a writing executed by both parties, by Your online acceptance of updated terms, or after Your continued participation in the Program after such terms have been updated by Google. The failure to require performance of any provision shall not affect a party's right to require performance at any time thereafter, nor shall a waiver of any breach or default of this Agreement constitute a waiver of any subsequent breach or default or a waiver of the provision itself. If any provision herein is held unenforceable, then such provision will be modified to reflect the parties' intention, and the remaining provisions of this Agreement will remain in full force and effect. You may not resell, assign, or transfer any of Your rights hereunder. Any such attempt may result in termination of this Agreement, without liability to Google. Notwithstanding the foregoing, Google may assign this Agreement to any affiliate at any time without notice. The relationship between Google and You is not one of a legal partnership relationship, but is one of independent contractors.

Friday, July 4, 2008

Pay per click (PPC)

What
Pay-per-click (PPC) search advertising done right is highly accountable and a key driver of qualified leads and sales. But it costs money, and sometimes lots of money, so you want a smart, experienced PPC manager who will manage your money as carefully as you do. With @WSP, you can expect your PPC manager to build and manage a campaign that will:

1. Attract the most highly qualified visitors to your website.

2. Provide ongoing testing at Google, Yahoo!, MSN & more.

3. Deliver a Cost-per-Click that meets your Cost-per-Acquisition targets.

How
Successful PPC campaigns require top-notch strategizing, implementing, analyzing and then testing, testing, testing.

To successfully manage your PPC campaigns, we:

1. Identify the language a company's target audiences uses when looking for products or services important to the Client.

2. Create, monitor and expand lists of "negative" keywords to further control costs.

3. Set up accounts at selected search engines and other portals.

4. Set up accounts for testing at search engine content networks, where appropriate, for both text and image ads.

5. Develop compelling titles and descriptions for the ads.

6. Test the performance of different creative, landing pages, and keywords.

7. Test day-parting, geo-targeting and more.

8. Manage, track and optimize for ROI.

9. Report on cost-per-visitor and cost-per-conversion for every keyword in your campaign.

Web site optimization

When you're building a new website or completely renovating an old one, it's important to create your design in
a search engine friendly way. The choices you make are going to be with you for a long time and errors will be very time-consuming to repair at a later stage.

In other parts of this site, we've looked at how to make individual pages rank well. Now, let's focus on website optimization and examine your site as a whole. We'll go over the design techniques and principles that the search engines like, but we'll also take a brief glimpse at some potential pitfalls. Welcome aboard, I hope you enjoy the trip!
Use as much text as possible

When the World Wide Web was born in the early 1990's, it was mainly a text-based medium. Sounds, images and complex animations were either very rare or completely unheard of. Not surprisingly, the first major search engines that came around a couple years later were built to classify and rank WWW pages largely based on textual content. After all, the WWW consisted of text and would continue to do so for the foreseeable future, right?

Towards the late 1990's, the web had started to change. Although the role of text was still very important, it was now common for web pages to contain large images, Flash animations and other bells and whistles. However, due to numerous technical difficulties, the search engines were unable to widen their reach beyond the world of text. While search engines that specifically search for images have been created, general-purpose engines still mostly ignore everything that is not in text.

The moral of the story is, unless your pages are built to contain a lot of text, they're unlikely to do well in most search engines. This doesn't mean that you should drop all the images from your website, but keep in mind that as far as the search engines are concerned, images, Flash animation and sounds do not exist.
Keep non-HTML code in external files

Many of today's sites use JavaScript, CSS, or both in their designs. Some of them have quite a lot of code in these languages on each of their pages and have placed it above the HTML containing the text used on the page. In terms of website optimization, this is a bad idea.

First of all, it forces the spider to wade through something that it is not at all interested in before being able to read the text. While modern spiders are probably quite well-accustomed to such unfriendly pages, it's safe to say that filling your pages with non-HTML code is more likely to hurt than to help you.

Second, the less the search engine knows what kind of CSS and JavaScript you use, the better. If your code is attached to the HTML, search engine spiders can freely read and analyze it if they want to. On the other hand, if you place your code in external files and use a robots.txt file to forbid search engines from downloading them, your code is fairly secure. Of course the search engines could still get it if they wanted to, but then they would have to both disobey your robots.txt and grab the .css or .js file, both things that they're unlikely to do.

But why would you want to keep your CSS and JavaScript away from the eyes of the search engines if you're not doing anything wrong? Well, the problem is that search engines define what is acceptable and what is not, and it often seems like they have a lot of trouble making up their minds. For example, using a JavaScript redirect is occasionally "OK, if you have a legitimate reason for doing it" and occasionally "spamming, and we'll skin you from head to toe if we catch you". The point is that it's better to be safe than sorry, because the rules change all the time.
Frames or tables - or CSS?

The layout of your website and the way it is created is another factor that can either boost or reduce your search engine success. Here at the APG site, I've decided to use a table-based layout, which is usually considered something both human visitors and search engines can appreciate. However, it is not the only method available and all of them have their pro's and con's.
Tables

Search engines generally don't have any trouble reading a table-based page, provided that the layout is not overly complex or incorrectly designed. The only serious problem arises if you wish to have a navigation menu on the left side of the screen, just like I do. Placing the menu on the left causes its contents to be displayed above the rest of the content on the page in your source code. Humans won't mind about that, but because search engines read your source code rather than what you see on the screen, this kind of arrangement may damage your ranking in them.

You see, most search engines consider the text at the very top of the page to be more important than the one at the middle. This sounds a bit odd, but it's actually a very reasonable assumption. Take a look at some of the pages on this site for example; if you begin reading from the top, it won't take long before you've got a general idea about the contents of the page. But if you start from the middle, it will take on average substantially longer to determine what subject is being discussed.

So, if your menu pushes the actual content of your page downwards in your source code, the search engine will have difficulty determining what your page is about, which might cause your ranking to drop. However, fortunately there is a solution to this problem that allows you to use tables, keep your menu on the left and please the search engines at the same time. If you plan to use tables, I recommend using the table trick.
Frames

Some like them, some hate them. Think of them what you will, but generally frames are not as search engine friendly as tables. That is not to say that its impossible to build a site that uses frames and does well in the engines, it is just harder to do than with tables.

If you already have a site that uses frames, or if you just are determined to use them, it would be a good idea to implement a few website optimization tricks to prevent some of the most common problems.

A Promotion Guide

Keyword optimization, the art of choosing the correct keywords, is one of the most important things related to search engine
optimization. Sadly, it's also one of the things people tend to spend too little time on. They think up a few keywords quickly, optimize their pages a bit and then submit them to the engines. This usually results in not-so-good rankings under keywords that are poorly related to the site in question.

Before you start optimizing your site for the search engines, you should spend some time in figuring out exactly what keywords, or what keyphrases, you are going to target. Search engines are an excellent source of traffic, but in order to utilize them to their full potential, some effort is required.

What you should do is not to rush things. Sit down, open up your favorite text editor in one window and your site in another. Read through the first page of your site. When you have read it, stop to think. What is this page about? Which of the words that appear in the document describe the contents of the page accurately? What kind of words or phrases would someone use if he was using a search engine and trying to find documents like this?

When you have found the answers to these questions, write down the words and the phrases you have come up with. It doesn't matter if the list becomes too long, as you can always remove some of the excess words later.

When I do keyword optimization, I usually select one or two medium-popular keywords or phrases per page. These are my main targets, and I optimize heavily for them. Then I squeeze a few less common phrases and words into the body text, hoping that they will help the page to come up on some obscure multi-word searches.

Repeat this process for every page on your site. You should be able to create an individual, distinct list of keywords for each page. The different lists should not "compete" with each other, instead each should cover different areas. This does not however mean that there shouldn't be any similarities between your lists - it's perfectly OK to have some, but the lists shouldn't be 100% identical. It is better to have 20 good listings on different search terms than 20 good listings on the same one.

So, now you have your lists ready. The next thing would be to go to Overture's (GoTo) keyword suggestion tool and type in the different keywords and phrases you've come up with. The tool will tell you how many times each keyword and each phrase was searched at Overture during the last month. It won't tell you exactly how popular different words are, since the statistics contain only the searches executed at Overture, but it will give you a general idea.

Because Overture's data is not always 100% accurate, you may also want to visit WordTracker. The service is not free, but the trial option offers a chance to search for good keywords without having to pay a dime. By using both Overture and WordTracker and comparing what they think about the popularity of different keywords, you should be able to separate the words people search for from those that are rarely used.

If some of the words you were planning to select aren't commonly used in searches, you might want to consider dropping them from your list. If other words look like they are used quite a lot, then it might be a good idea to consider adding them. But remember to...
Keep the search engine optimization process in mind!

By now, your list is probably pretty full of very competitive, single-word terms such as "MP3" or "books" or "computers" or whatever. Scratch them. This might sound harsh, but if you're a novice, you have no chance of achieving a top listing under such terms. Even many (dare I say most) professionals tend to avoid them, as they are extremely competitive. There are hundreds of thousands of sites targeting them and even with excellent search engine optimization skills, they are very tough to conquer. What you should do is to narrow it down a little.

Think about different variations of these popular keywords. If you were originally thinking about the keyword "books", how about "buy used books online" or "antique bookstore"? These terms would be, not easy, but easier to rank well under. It is far better to be in the top 10 for a search term with medium usage than to rank 500th for a heavily used term. Select keyphrases that do get searched, but that aren't too competitive.

You might also want to target common misspellings, if some of the keywords related to your site are often spelled wrong . Unfortunately, it is hard to efficiently target misspellings without damaging the authority of your site. Would you buy anything from a person that can't even spell the name of his merchandise? Didn't think so.. So, be careful with those misspellings.

At this point, you should have completed your keyword optimization process and now possess a pretty good list of medium-popularity keyword phrases for each of your pages. I would recommend that you read the search engine optimization article on this site next. It will show you where you should place the keywords you have selected in order to achieve results with the search engines.