Google AdSense Archives

A WebmasterWorld thread reports that Ad Review Center, which helps Google AdSense publishers block advertisers, has dropped all the advertisers from showing up in the list.

But Google really did not hide all these advertisers from their publishers. It appears that based on how you actually access the Ad Review Center, you may see different options.

Russ noticed it seems to be a rendered bug of some sort. Russ had to click on the blocked tab and then re-click on the allowed tab. Once he did that, the ads showed up again.

I tried this myself and it is 100% a bug. You load up the Ad Review Center and the "Allowed" tab shows up empty. So I clicked on the "Blocked" tab and then clicked back onto the "Allowed" tab and the ads showed up again.

So this seems like a small bug that seems to be freaking out some AdSense publishers.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

InformationWeek reports that there's a class action suit against Google about having AdSense on parked domains when they aren't likely to yield conversions. In the specific case, a legal services provider had his ads running for about 6 weeks on parked pages. He received over 200,000 impressions, 668 clicks, and zero conversions. The plaintiff spent $136.11 and is disappointed that he had nothing to show for it. By forming a class action suit, he and his lawyers are hoping that this affects other Google advertisers.

Barry writes about the lawsuit at Search Engine Land and makes sure to point out that the ads were running when Google announced that advertisers can opt out of AdSense for Domains.

Meanwhile, forum members say that this can put a damper on the domaining industry. It also makes the lawyer (specifically the one behind the lawsuit) look silly for suing Google when he isn't seemingly reading the fine print and learning how to use Google AdWords effectively. They feel that the plaintiff, an individual named Hal K. Levitte, is just looking for a big fat check from Google but that he's wasting his time. Other people think that Google's "AdSense for Domains," specifically for domains that lack content, is a bad strategy.

This sentiment is echoed by others as well. Why would you want to spend your money on parked domains? And why would visitors actually hang around?

Forum discussion continues at DigitalPoint Forums and WebmasterWorld.

After Google began testing new AdSense fonts back in May of this year, including testing comic sans - Google has finally decided to drop it based on publisher complaints.

AdSenseAdvisor at WebmasterWorld said:

Based on publisher feedback, we have removed Comic Sans from the current ad format experiment. Thanks again for your continued feedback and suggestions. We welcome any further feedback that you might have and assure you that it'll be passed onto the relevant team.

I am not sure if they should have removed it completely. It would have been nice to have it as an option and give publishers the ability to pick and choose which font types they would like to opt in on. Why are you able to pick your sizes, backgrounds, corner styles but not your font type?

In any event, Google removed Comic Sans completely from the font selection for AdSense.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

The holiday weekend has come and gone, and most people have taken vacations with their families. The last thing many people do is sit at their computer and make purchases or surf the web.

As every addicted Google AdSense publisher (or AdWords advertiser) can tell you, visits and clicks go down substantially during this period. With a three (and for some, four) day weekend in the US, this was definitely the case. A WebmasterWorld forums member explains that his visits were down 35-40%. One other one said that his eCPM for the month of July was absolutely horrible -- but then again, we're only in week one of the month and the holiday is behind us now.

On the other hand, a few people didn't see a drop in traffic at all. They saw stability, which is a little rarer. Then again, they might have the right type of content to attract the weekend/holiday crowd.

On average, though, there were more observed drops in traffic and clicks.

How did you fare?

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

A WebmasterWorld thread has discussion around the various classifications of an MFA site (made for AdSense). The question is, what is the true definition of such a site? Is there a gray area or is it black and white?

One member classifies three types of sites running AdSense:

1. A site that has content that consists only of ads.
2. A site that has substandard content, and lots of ads.
3. A site that has good content, and ads that take up no more than 1/3 of the available space.

Now, I am sure there are shades between. How about a site with really good content, but the only way to see that content is to scroll past the AdSense ads. I know several sites like this, and I wouldn't consider them MFAs, cause I scroll past the ads to read the content. Maybe the sites that you hit the back button on, would be the proper classification here?

Senior member zett adds his classification of an MFA:

• Ad units blended.
• Ad units in places where you would expect navigation or content.
• Mediocre/generic/useless content.
• No outbound links except Adsense ads or link to the same site (with more crap).
• New domain, no PR, only way to get traffic is to buy cheap Adsense traffic (with ads that promise things the landing page cannot keep).
• Private domain registration.
• No real contact information on site.

But let's poll the audience here and ask you, based on the three types of sites listed above, which are MFAs. Here is the poll, check ALL that apply:

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

A WebmasterWorld thread discusses the pros and cons of using Google's allowed sites feature in AdSense. In short, the Allowed Sites feature is a tool to tell Google, where you want your ads to show. For example, if someone steals your content and takes your ads with your content, they are in a sense, showing your ads. You can specify to Google, I only want my ads to display on specific domains or subdomains.

Google began testing this feature back in June of 2007 and based on popular request they launched it in late August. Google then had several bugs in the tool that worried many publishers.

So what are the pros and cons of using this feature:

Pros:

• Control your ads
• Ensure you don't get your account disabled because of someone else's content
• Calm your paranoia

Cons:

• Bugs can prevent your ads from displaying (rare)
• You won't make money on those scraper sites
• Users cant view your ads on translation pages
• You may forget to allow some of your sites

I am sure I missed some items, so feel free to comment.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Google offers automated and often repetitive messages, known as AdSense optimization tips. You get one virtually every month, on the first on the month. Mine have typically said that I should add more AdSense units to my pages.

In this month's release, some AdSense publishers are reporting receiving a tip to add Referral ads to their sites. Here is the message:

Referrals can add incremental revenue to your site.

You are not currently using Referrals on your sites.

Why is this an issue? Well, Google just announced that they are dropping referral ads within the next two months. In fact, Google suggested that publishers remove the referral ads as soon as possible, so why are they automatically suggesting that publishers add them this month?

Automation at its best. :)

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Some major news hit the presses last night, where Google announced on the AdWords Blog and AdSense Blog that they are retiring the pay-per-action program, putting an end to Google AdSense's referral program. I cannot say I am surprised, we reported that the future of Google's PPA program was uncertain and that they were "having second thoughts of the product." So this comes as no surprise.

The news is that Google is launching a new affiliate network named Google Affiliate Network to replace Google's PPA/Referral program. The Google PPA/Referrals program is folding the last week of August. Google recommends that all AdSense publishers who use the referrals product to (1) remove the referral code from your site and (2) to run and save all referrals reports on your desktop.

There are many blog entries and news reports on this announcement. You can find much of it summarized at Techmeme.

There is a ton of forum discussion around this announcement. I am going to list out all the threads and you can scan what you find to be more appropriate:

• AdSense Referrals Program to End in August 2008, WebmasterWorld
• Adsense Referrals to be cancelled by August 2008, DigitalPoint Forums
• Announcing Google Affiliate Network, DigitalPoint Forums
• Doubleclick Performics is now Google Affiliate Network!, WebmasterWorld
• Google Retires AdSense Referrals, Sphinn
• Google Stops Adsense Referrals Program, HighRankings Forums
• The end of adsense referrals!, Search Engine Roundtable Forums

Stuart McDonald posted a thread at WebmasterWorld explaining how you can use Google Ad Manager with Google AdSense to specify a minimum eCPM.

You must keep in mind that you need to have other ads in your Ad Manager inventory to compete with your AdSense ads, in order for this to work properly. Google Ad Manager allows you to set a minimum CPM for most ad runs. By specifying the minimum CPM with house or remnant ads in Ad Manager, your AdSense ads will compete on the CPM you set and will not show for a lower CPM.

Stuart explains you will likely see that the "immediate result will probably be a drop in your AdSense income, as long as you're running other, better paying ads (from direct advertisers, another network or whatever), your end resultant income for the total number of impressions, should be higher."

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

AdSensePro Stephanie has posted in a Google Groups thread to announce two new additions to the forum.

AdSensePro Jennifer and AdSensePro Adrian are going to be the two newest forum guides in Google Groups and will answer your questions about Google AdSense. AdSesnePro Stephanie will be checking the forums, albeit less frequently due to "other projects."

Best of luck to Stephanie and welcome to Jennifer and Adrian!

Forum discussion continues at Google Groups.

Google AdSense was formally announced on June 18, 2003. Now, it is five years old and still going strong. Within 2 days, WebmasterWorld had its own Google Adsense forum where people are talking about how Google AdSense has helped them.

In five years, some have been making enough to earn a decent living off of Google AdSense. Many admit that Google AdSense is the best monetization program for their website. Martinibuster adds:

For a program that you can just set it and forget it, it is without peer. There's nothing out there that approaches it if you have the right niche and have cultivated the right traffic.

Many people's reflections on Google AdSense over the past 5 years has been a positive one. May the next 5 years be just as fruitful for these people and newcomers to Google AdSense.

Want more coverage of Google AdSense? We have 658 articles in Search Engine Roundtable's Google AdSense category.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Google has confirmed the Google AdSense Fonts tests as being tests at WebmasterWorld. Since then I have tried to compile some real world examples of these fonts in action. Thanks to a DigitalPoint Forums thread, I was able to find a new AdSense font. Here it is:

Compare that to the normal fonts:

Compare that to comic sans font:

Forum discussion continued at WebmasterWorld and DigitalPoint Forums.

In May we first reported on Google testing out some new fonts for the Google AdSense ads. We then posted examples of Google testing comic sans font in their ad type, as you can see from the image at the right of this text. Most publishers were not happy with the extreme font change that was being tests on some publisher sites.

Well, it appears these tests are getting more drastic. Reports come from WebmasterWorld that Google is continuing with their font tests. The fonts observed by one publisher include:

• Times
• Plain Serif
• No Serif
• Vanilla
• Arial
• Big Point
• Small Point
• Comic Sans

One publisher said he noticed these as well, but also noticed that his click-through rate is "way up." That results in more cash for the publisher and Google.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

DigitalPoint Forum members are chatting about Britney Spears's new official web site at britneyspears.com having Google AdSense ads at the bottom.

Britney Spears's web site seems to be currently being redesigned by MusicToday. MusicToday has placed the Google AdSense ads at the bottom of the page. Of course, the AdSense publishers are the DigitalPoint Forums thread are contemplating the positioning of these ads.

If you take a look at the thumbnail image at the top right of this post, you can see the ads at the bottom, under the main site. Need a better look, either go to the web site or click on the image.

I assume this is just a template used by MusicToday until the site is ready. I doubt there is anything to look into here. I assume those ads would monetize well, if clicked on.

Why am I pointing this out:
(1) Google is a hot topic, but so is Britney Spears, so titling a post Britney Spears and Google might bring in some interesting traffic, which I can share with you later.
(2) It is a fairly slow weekend for forums, so I figured I point you to a very active thread on a light topic.

Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums.

We've been warning you to link your Google AdSense account to a Google account for months. Google is now making it official. A WebmasterWorld member says that he received an email saying that he will have to do it soon or else. His reason for not doing it beforehand is that it wasn't broken and it's just kind of pointless for Google to fix what ain't broke.

Meanwhile, in our previously mentioned Google Groups thread, a few updates and clarifications have been made. First, Ashley from Google says that once your account is migrated, you will have to use that Google email address to log into your AdSense account. Second, she says that if you have another Google account that is not a login for your AdSense account, it can be deleted without disabling access to the AdSense account (but it will disable access to other services associated with that login).

Of note: one member is having difficulty performing the actual merge. Maybe it will still be a few weeks while Google irons out the technical problems with this. The discussion related to this technical issue is at Google Groups and additional forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Reuters summarizes a recent comScore report that indicates that Google ad views are increasing. The article states:

Web tracking firm comScore Inc's monthly report on "paid clicks" showed Google's U.S. growth at 19.6 percent in April from a year ago, compared with growth of 2.7 percent in March and 3.1 percent in February, according to analysts.

Forum members believe that this means the recession is over. (Or perhaps people are clicking because they're dreaming to buy products they can't afford during the recession.)

But it could mean that ad views may have been down in the past and this shows an increase.

Still, other forum members are disappointed in the poor ad targeting that has been impacting publishers for a good amount of time. They feel that a lot of these clicks shouldn't happen because they're not as contextual as they should be.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

There are two WebmasterWorld threads and some Google Groups threads reporting that some AdSense ads sporadically are disappearing.

Several publishers are reporting that a new ad they placed on a particular page received impressions and clicks on day one and then on day two, the ad received no impressions and when the publisher checked out the page, he/she was shocked to see the ad missing. Here is one publisher's story:

Adsense were being displayed on it and I got around 35 clicks. Now today Adsense is not displaying ads on this page

Here is another post from a senior member:

There have been a couple of threads lately where someone mentioned ads were not appearing on their site(s). Just a blank space was there - no PSA's, nothing.

I've noticed it myself a couple of times and on pages that have had good targeted ads for years. One minute the ads aren't there - return to the page a few minutes later and they're back.

Over the course of a few days, a bunch of these types of threads have been popping up. I'm going to place a new ad below this line and you guys let me know if you see it or not:

I guess keep checking back over the course of the next few hours and let me know. It does seem very out of the ordinary for an AdSense ad not to render. Maybe Google is having ad server issues or maybe it is something else?

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld and Google Groups.

Confirmed: The ads are disappearing, even my test ad above. Here is a screen shot, I even tried refreshing 5 times, very rarely does the ad show up:

Let's say you hosted a government website with over 1 million visitors monthly. You'd probably want to monetize it. What about considering Google AdSense? It's a possibility; the contextual ads are likely to be well-targeted. Thousands of websites employ Google AdSense to make some money off their content, so it's not unheard of to try this in the government sector. The question, though, is what happens if some sketchy ads from undesirable businesses or bogus sites go through on the website? It may look like an endorsement that the government doesn't want to be affiliated with.

Very few people in the thread suggest that it will work. "Be inconspicuous about it," one forum member recommends. Most say that it's offensive to add AdSense on sites that are already being paid for by our tax dollars.

Others don't want government sites to run AdSense at all.

If governments start running Adsense on their websites, they obstruct fair competition and the free market.

Similar sentiment is echoed throughout the discussion:

The government should be independent and therefore cannot put any ads on their site promoting either 'store A' or 'store B' nor advertise for blue or green widgets.

Do some people want it? Only if it reduces our taxes and funds education. That's very likely not going to happen, so they'll probably never say yes.

There's always the Ad Review Center which integrates a competitive ad filter for ads that you don't want to endorse. There's likely to be a lot of overhead involved for a government site, though.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

We posted about the requirement to link Google AdSense accounts with a Google Account in February. As indicated in the comments of that blog post, the frustration of doing so is still there and a lot of publishers are not taking the plunge as a result.

Well, Google is reminding you that you have no choice. You'll need to do it, according to a Google Groups thread. AdSensePro Ashley refers to a new post on the Inside AdSense blog which states that if you don't make the change, you'll be locked out of your account -- for good. (Roger, I'm sorry.)

There's no exact date for when this will be rolled out, but Google states that it will be a requirement "in the next few weeks."

Forum discussion continues at Google Groups.

What's worse than having pop-up ads on your website? Having ads on your website that aren't actually contextual and aren't properly matching the text of your website to draw in prospects. (Well, maybe it's not worse, but it's surely frustrating a lot of publishers.) At WebmasterWorld, incrediBILL says that "[t]here were ads for all sorts of junk linking to sites that didn't have what it claimed, Amazon affiliates, off topic garbage, even phone company directory listings." He started trying to weed out the bad ads by hand, but says that his filter list is already full, so it wasn't easy to do.

Bill is not alone. It seems that a lot of other publishers are starting to filter out up to 90% of new ads that are using the Google AdSense program. Publishers complain that "[a]pparently the targeted ads aren't quality/relevance checked at all by Google," which doesn't make the viability of AdSense a strong one at this time.

Is there a correlation to a holiday weekend? Some forum members suggest that to be the case. One member says that "[l]ow advertiser inventory lowers the threshold to the bottom feeders." But others contest this claim, saying that bottom feeders should cease to exist if Google is really screening them for quality. This is a valid point.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Google announced that AdSense (the AdWords content network) now supports the use of third-party ad serving techniques and technologies. I am not sure if most publishers understand the significance of this. Many large companies would not even think about placing an ad on a publisher's site without being able to track the results of those ads (impressions and clicks) through a third-party ad serving intermediary. Got that?

What this now brings to AdSense are major agencies and advertisers with large budgets, who are now more willing to dip their ad budgets in Google's content network. More advertisers with bigger budgets means more money for AdSense publishers.

There are a few requirements for these ads to show up on AdSense publishers sites.

(1) You must opt into image ads
(2) Enable advertisers to target your AdSense channels
(3) Opt into placement targeting

If you have all three, then you can now enable advertisers to place these ads on your site.

Will the ads look different? Yes, they shockingly won't contain the 'Ads by Google' text near the ad. Even more of a reason for larger advertisers to use the Google content network.

Will the ads act differently? Yes, they will open in a new window as opposed to staying in the same window.

Which third party tracking vendors are certified?

(A) North America: Ad servers include DoubleClick DFA and Mediaplex/ValueClick
(B) North America: Rich media include DoubleClick Rich Media, Eyeblaster, EyeWonder, Interpolls, Pointroll, and Unicast.
(C) North America: Research include Dynamic Logic/Safecount, Factor TG, IAG, and InsightExpress.

You may need to update your privacy policy to include more details about these third-party tracking techniques. More on that over here.

Can you block these ads? Many you can by using the competitive ad filter, but the third-party Flash ads you cannot block without contacting Google.

Here are three videos from Google on 3rd-party ad serving to help explain it better. It is a three part series by one of our favorite Google personalities, Maile:

Forum discussion at Google Groups, Cre8asite Forums and WebmasterWorld.

A WebmasterWorld thread has a discussion around why Google might not allow you to add more then three AdSense ad units per page.

WebmasterWorld's wyweb, a senior member, has a great theory. He explains that, imagine your web site is your house. Would it be fair to your neighbors to paste billboards all over your house and lawn? Not necessarily.

Zoning laws still apply. You can try to have them changed or you can move to a neighborhood with more favorable (to you) laws.

Is Google providing some type of zoning law for ads on the Internet? I am not sure. I think it might have to do more about ad inventory. If you have a page about a big blue pineapple chair (I love going back to that post), then how many relevant ads can Google possibly show? Nine ads seem like a lot already and typically, Google will show 9 or 12 ads, at most, on a web search page, query dependent. So, I would think it is more about inventory control.

Overall, you can do very well with three ad units. Just test your placement and color schemes and see what works best for you.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Dozens and dozens of Google AdSense publishers have reported receiving an email from Google with the subject line, "Important Account Information." The email basically was a reminder to those publishers who have not yet accepted the updated terms and conditions from February.

The issue is, the email was sent to many publishers who have already accepted the new terms and conditions. As AdSenseAdvisor said in the WebmasterWorld thread:

Our team sent an email today with the subject line "Important Account Information", which was a reminder to accept the February changes to the Terms and Conditions. However, we have found that we sent the email to a number of publishers who already agreed to the new terms. We apologize for the confusion caused, and in the next few days we will be sending another message to publishers who received today's email in error.

What is a bit humorous to me, is that Google AdSense recently sent out a mass email to publishers who were not suppose to get that email. In November, Google sent out a tax update email that looked to be a bit "phishy," because it asked publishers to login and update their tax information. The email was sent to publishers who have completed their tax information already, and was a mistake - it should have been sent to only a select number of publishers.

Same here, this email should have been sent to only a select number of publishers who have not yet agreed to the new terms and conditions.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld and DigitalPoint Forums.

Numerous new Google AdSense publishers are reporting that they are trying to get their phone numbers verified with Google AdSense in the UK, but Google is not calling their phone numbers to complete the verification process.

AdSensePro Ashley writes that this seems to be a problem and Google is aware and is working on it.

Thanks for your reports. Please be assured that we are aware that some publishers are currently unable to complete the phone verification process. We are working to fix this issue.

I guess the only solution for now is to wait.

Forum discussion continues at Google Groups.

A featured WebmasterWorld thread has a fun list of "not to do with your AdSense account because Google might ban you for these things." Here is the list complied by a new member, BrandNewDay:

• Click your own ads
• Asking other people to click your ads
• Joining a program that promises you that people will click your ads if you click their ads
• Telling all your friends about your sites
• Exchanging Adsense code with other people or programs
• Buying and/or operating so called "Adsense ready sites"
• Having sites with only ads and/or search results on them
• Taking/stealing other peoples content without their permission

Of course, with any list like this, there are arguments and discussion about the details.

Later on, WebmasterWorld moderator, httpwebwitch, adds some more:

• allow malware to be installed on your server, or on the machine which is used to access the account
• use any of those "adsense click tracking" JavaScripts
• allow multiple people to log in to the account using the same password
• log in through an anonymizing proxy
• hack into the system and start requesting Adsense ads in raw XML
• mess around with the iframe in which they're displayed
• try to sidestep the cross-domain scripting limitations using a server proxy

The list can go on forever. One thing you should not do, a huge AdSense No-No, in my opinion, is obsess over each rule.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

First, congrats on your wedding - I like to personally wish you both a long happy life together.

Now, let's get down to the money... You make a lot of money with Google AdSense. But now that you are married and you are taking on your spouse's name, you want to get the checks made out to your new last name. How do you go about changing your name on Google AdSense, so that you and your new spouse can share in the huge amounts of money you are making with Google AdSense?

That is the question asked at a Google Groups thread. AdSensePro Stephanie offers a link as aid on changing one's payee name. The process is fairly simple, you simply fill out the Change Payee Name AdSense form and wait. But here are some of the rules behind changing the payee name:

• According to our program policies, AdSense accounts cannot be transferred or sold. If this is your reason for requesting the change, we will not be able to update your payee name.
• You won't be able to change your payee name if you already have another AdSense account under that name.
• Once we've updated your information, you'll need to re-enter your tax information and form of payment.
• If you've received a payment to the old payee name that you're unable to deposit, you'll need to request a reissue after the 25th of the month following your payment.
• We start processing payments on the 16th of each month. If you're scheduled to receive a payment this month and the payee name in your account is updated after the 16th, your payment will be issued to your old name.

Again, to change your AdSense payee name to your new spouse's name, use the Google AdSense Change Payee Name Form and congrats!

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

Image sourced from Steena on Flickr

Yesterday we reported about a major reporting bug that impacted both AdWords & AdSense users. Yesterday at about 9pm (EST), Google's AdSensePro Stephanie said the reports were now fixed. Yes, that is about 40 hours after received our first reports of the outage. Stephanie said:

This reporting issue has now been fixed, so you should now see all of your missing data from yesterday in your account. (We've also reflected this update on our Known Issues page at https://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/answer.py?answer=92365.) I'll leave this thread pinned to the top of this category for another day, to make sure more forum members see this update.

Thank you all again for your continued patience, and our team sincerely apologizes for the delay.

Even though Google said the issue is now fixed, many AdSense publishers are not convinced. All the replies to Stephanie's post claim the reporting issues were not resolved. Of the five replies, all five said the reports still seem way off.

AdSenseAdvisor posted an updated at the WebmasterWorld thread also, this reply was at 4:06 am (EST) this morning saying the issues have been resolved. But like the Google Groups thread, the publishers in that thread are all not convinced the reports are bug free.

Forum discussion at Google Groups and WebmasterWorld.

A few weeks ago, I ran a poll asking Which Day Do You Make Most Your Google AdSense Income?

We now have 92 responses, over the course of the week and most people voted that Monday they earned the most revenue on average from Google AdSense. Note that this is a very small sampling. I am not surprised that Saturdays and Fridays are the smallest earning days for publishers (being a publisher myself). I am a bit surprised by the Thursday response, but again, this is a small sampling.

Here are the results:

:: Monday - 24 responses - 26%
:: Tuesday - 18 responses - 20%
:: Sunday - 14 responses - 15%
:: Wednesday - 12 responses - 13%
:: Thursday - 8 responses - 9%
:: Friday - 8 responses - 9%
:: Saturday - 8 responses - 9%

Forum discussion continued at DigitalPoint Forums.

Honestly, I am not sure if this is brand new, but a DigitalPoint Forums thread reports the Large Rectangle (336 x 280) unit as having four text ads within it as new.

Here is a screen capture of the ad unit:

A typical ad unit looks like what you see listed on the Google AdSense ad formats page. I.e. four lines of ads and not four boxes of ads. Here is a live ad from my AdSense account for testing purposes:

Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums.

Starting at about 5am (EST) yesterday, I have been noticing reports in the forums about Google being slow to update both the AdSense reports and the AdWords reports. The two largest threads discussing the issues can be found at WebmasterWorld and Google Groups, but there are plenty of other threads throughout the forums with complaints.

Again, first reports came in at about 5am (EST) yesterday and the issues have still not been resolved. We do have reassurance from Google in the WebmasterWorld and Google Groups threads that the issue is only reporting related and all the data is being tracked. When the reporting issues are fixed, it will show correct data.

AdSenseAdvisor posted at WebmasterWorld saying:

Thanks for your comments and your patience, and apologies for the delay. Our engineering team is working to address this issue as soon as possible. Please be assured that your account statistics have still been tracked, and we are working on displaying them in your account.

I will be sure to post with any additional updates.

AdSensePro Stephanie posted twice in the Google Groups thread (and other Google Groups threads) saying:

I've escalated your reports to our engineers, and they're currently investigating the issue. I'll be sure to update this thread as soon as I have any more info -- thanks for your patience in the meantime.

She then added a little bit later:

I've just received an update from our engineers: they're still working on resolving the issue, but they have confirmed that no statistics or data have been lost from your accounts. I'll let you know when I have more info about when you might expect to see updated stats. Again, we appreciate your patience.

The WebmasterWorld thread has over a 130 posts, and the Google Groups thread has almost a 100 posts.

In addition, you can see the brand new AdSense Known Issues page for an update that shows the issue is still not resolved, as of 7:45am (EST) today.

Forum discussion on both the AdWords and AdSense side at the following threads:

• Google Groups - AdSense
• WebmasterWorld - AdWords
• WebmasterWorld - AdSense
• Search Engine Watch Forums - AdSense
• DigitalPoint Forums - AdSense
• DigitalPoint - AdSense

The Inside AdSense blog talks about the newest feature available to Google AdSense users: AdSense for Search is now powered by custom search. This new feature gives you the following benefits: site search, improved indexing of pages, vertical search, the ability to fine tune search results and ads with keywords, selecting ad location, and more.

Check out the video for more information:

As someone who had an extremely difficult time trying to get Google Coop with AdSense installed on my site in the past, this was a breeze. Literally. I'm so glad that the Google AdSense team fixed it up. Thank you. :) (On that note, I *strongly* recommend that you set up your Google Custom Search Engine through the Google AdSense control panel, not through google.com/cse -- that's where my problems started!)

Forum discussion continues at DigitalPoint Forums, Google Groups, and WebmasterWorld.

Friday we reported that Google is testing new fonts in AdSense ads. Well, I finally found a screen capture of this in action via DigitalPoint Forums.

Here is the screen capture:

Pretty funky looking, no? If anything, this is a Google test and if they launch this new font, I hope they make it an option for the publisher. Personally, I find the font a bit unprofessional for many sites. But it may work for a specific type of site.

This may show signs that Google may be enabling the ability for publishers to pick a font style for their AdSense ads. If so, that is great news.

Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums.

A WebmasterWorld thread has speculation that Google is now seeking out AdSense arbitrageurs through AdWords accounts. The rumor is that Google is banning AdSense publishers by looking to see if their AdWords accounts are sending traffic to pages with AdSense on them.

About a year ago, we reported, Google To Shut Down AdSense Arbitrageurs. But then learned it was more focused on made-for-AdSense (MFAs) AdSense arbitrageurs. Google didn't deny that they have been going after some arbitrageurs but the topic died down a month later.

What this recent speculation is causing, is a rush for AdSense publishers to close out their AdWords accounts. They do not want their AdWords accounts to be tied to their AdSense account and possibly give Google a reason to ban them from AdSense. So many have reported that they shut down their AdWords account.

Is there sound reason for this or are publishers acting out of fear? I honestly don't know.

Hat tip to Frank for blogging this last night.

Forum discussion at W