Where is a good place to position ads?
When considering ad positioning, keep in mind who your web site visitors are and why they are looking at your site. For example, if you can place appropriate ads between relevant content on your site, you will increase the likelihood that the ads you do show will actually drive the behavior you are looking for.
Here are a few helpful tips to keep in mind when positioning ads on your page.
-Know why people are visiting your site. What is the user trying to accomplish by visiting your site? What do they do when viewing a particular page? Where is their attention likely to be focused? How can you integrate ads into this area without getting in the users' way? How can you keep the page looking clean, uncluttered and inviting?
-Remember all pages are not created equal. Ad units placed on traditionally less frequently viewed pages, such as Help or Contact Us, have a lower performance level.
-Use of Leader boards. Placing a leader board above the start of your main content is traditionally a highly visible location and tends to perform well. This location's effectiveness has diminished slightly for some publishers, as some users skip ahead to content when a page first loads.
Such a prominent placement does not appeal to some publishers who feel it detracts from their content and lowers their users' satisfaction with their site. Some prefer to place their ads in less-obvious but still eye-catching places.
Selecting the eye-catching but less-obvious locations can be challenging, especially if you don’t have budget for an eye tracking study. Most have to either rely on anticipating where and when users look or monitoring which locations perform best.
-Blend ads with page content. Assuming that your primary page content is set in the center column, placing square and rectangle ads in this space will typically produce results. Set your ad units within the path of content, and allow the text or media to wrap around the space occupied by the ad unit.
-Place ads next to rich content. Ads placed near rich content and navigational aids usually do well because users are focused on those areas of a page.
-Placing ads below the fold. Ads placed so low that users have to scroll to see them (this is called placing them "below the fold") tend to perform least well, with a few exceptions. If you have some useful functionality or eye-catching media near the footer, that may be a good place to put an extra ad unit.
On article pages, people often want more information about the topic after they've finished reading. Placing an ad unit immediately following an article provides relevant links to readers who want to continue reading about the subject. The same idea applies to forums; people tend to go straight to the bottom of interesting threads to read the most recent posts.
It is always good to test ad unit positioning to see how revenue is impacted. Ad positioning is part art and part science, so please remember you don't want to overwhelm your visitors with ads while trying to monetize your site as effectively as possible.
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