Comments on: Google AdSense makes you look unprofessional?

By: Et Voila! Blog Redesign Completed | graphic design art and typography blog

Et Voila! Blog Redesign Completed | graphic design art and typography blog — Thu, 17 May 2007 07:56:08 +0000

[...] reading David Dairey’s post about Adsense, I decided to relegate it to the third column, and move it way down; I intend to do away with it [...]

By: Joem

Joem — Wed, 16 May 2007 19:29:10 +0000

I think that too much ads will make any site unprofessional. Although it is true that most of us earn our profit through Internet advertising, too many ads will turn off some customers and visitors.

By: johno

johno — Wed, 16 May 2007 10:34:41 +0000

I concur with Bret on this one. I make enough on adsense to almost cover my hosting and domain name renewal. I use a single block of adsense. My pet hate is the adsense blocks preceding the content, or randomly spawning throughout a single post.

However, If I could replace the adsense bock on my site with a single advertiser/sponsor, then I would.

By: David Airey :: Creative Design ::

David Airey :: Creative Design :: — Mon, 14 May 2007 09:19:57 +0000

I dislike ads on websites too, phd, although providing they don’t distract from the content, and tie in with the site design, then it’s fine by me.

I show some ads up top in the ‘featured sites’ section, but keep it consistent with my layout. It helps with costs.

By: phd

phd — Mon, 14 May 2007 06:24:12 +0000

i’ve disliked ads - those sloppy horizontal or vertical bannered ads scattered all over a site waaay before adsense came…

people hated it that time too since they where not directly earning from it…

By: Nate Whitehill

Nate Whitehill — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 11:22:27 +0000

I took Adsense off my blog recently and almost immediately after, I sold 4 private advertising spots. I agree, for new blogs, Adsense is a big no-no and highly detracts from the quality of the blog. One has to ask themselves, is it really worth the few extra bucks a week?

By: The Sloof Lirpa Center

The Sloof Lirpa Center — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 01:01:51 +0000

The Sloof Lirpa Center just put out a (funny) warning about vulnerabilities in Google’s AdSense code. Seems to speak to the thread in this post.

http://www.slooflirpacenter.com

You can sign up for a beta invitation to ContextWeb’s new ad exchange, too. Top advertisers are within are network giving the professional look web publishers seek from their online advertising.

By: David Airey

David Airey — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 15:43:17 +0000

Bret, Rob, Mike, thanks for your personal insights on this.

Having read all the comments I think most of us agree that using AdSense depends on the audience you’re writing for, but at the end of the day it still takes away from the design of your site / blog.

By: Mike

Mike — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 07:07:01 +0000

I don’t know if this point has been made yet, but I think adsense is very niche dependent. If your niche area is geared more to technical users than I don’t think adsense makes a lot of sense. Your more technical users are going to using Firefox and adblockers to remove adsense ads - even if they’re using IE with full ads, they’re probably going to be savvy enough to know that what they’re looking for isn’t going to be found by clicking on an ad - and they’re definitely not going to be “tricked” into clicking on a blended ad inserted in your text. I’m not saying you shouldn’t use adsense, but you have to know your audience.

my .02 - Mike

By: Rob Hopcott

Rob Hopcott — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 19:00:09 +0000

Problem is we all have our own obsessions or points of view.

As an author, I find it’s all too easy to get far too closely involved in the words. My wife took one look at one of my sites, ignored the beautiful phrases and immediately criticized me all over the place about the appearance of the blog. Sadly, I’m sure she was right and I must change that template.

Again, I’m pretty blind to adsense but I quickly had to stay her hand as she moved the mouse in the direction of the ads on my site using my computer (close one!).

I guess it’s important to get other people’s opinions on site layout to blunt the effect of one’s own prejudices.

But, I’m still only really interested in the words.

Rob Hopcott (online author)