Google Ads Experiment

posted on february 26, 2004, tag: site

Way back when AdSense first started becoming popular on weblogs, I applied for the program and was denied. I was told my site what too "personal," and that it didn't conform to Google's requirements. I sent Google an email with a list of about 10 sites I found that were serving AdSense banners that were "personal," or at least as personal as my site was. Their reply was something along the lines of "oh well, your site is still denied."

Shortly after xPad was released, I reapplied for the program with the forwarding domain getxpad.com. The application wouldn't accept a forwarding domain, so I changed it to the actual URL, maniacalrage.net/xpad. I was denied. The reason: Google cannot accept subdomains or non-root paths—a user must be able to place ads on any page in the domain. This pissed me off. After all, I had already applied for the whole domain and been denied, so what did I have to lose? I sent Google this email:

I am capable of running AdSense ads on all pages within the domain, you just won't approve the other sections of my domain because you say they're too "personal."

Meanwhile, I get 38,000+ unique visitors and 500,000+ hits a month and you're losing the opportunity to make money.

The site you just denied [the xPad site] is currently receiving at least 1,000 unique hits a day and is linked on over 40 major websites.

Your loss.

garrett

Suprisingly, a few hours later, I received this reply:

Hello Garrett,

Thank you for your continued interest in Google AdSense.

Our AdSense representatives review all AdSense applications according to our Terms and Conditions ( http://www.google.com/adsense/terms ) and our program policies ( http://www.google.com/adsense/policies ). I apologize if the prior disapproval of your application was made in error.

I have now reviewed and confirmed that your website meets all of our policies. Your application has been approved. Please check for a separate application approval email for your records. The approval email also includes detailed instructions on how to access your new account and get started.

Sincerely,

The Google Team

Now, it seems one of two things happened between the time I sent my email and the time they replied—one, a real human being actually looked at the content of my site, rather than some sort of automated system; two, Google saw the numbers and decided that even if it was too personal, they could make some money off of me. Regardless, at the end of the day we both got what we wanted.

I've placed the ads in several places—all the archive pages (including individual entry pages), the plugin page and the xPad page. They're all very small (two vertical ads) and in the sidebar. You shouldn't really even notice them.

The point here is to see if they generate any income. If you feel like clicking them, go right ahead. I'll probably ad a checkbox in the future that allows you to hide them if you wish (if I decide to keep them at all), but in the mean time let's just see what happens.

Comments

There are 5 comments, comments are closed