Have you ever clicked on a link on a Webpage just as the browser reshuffled elements on the page, so that you inadvertently clicked an ad? I have, although a simple click of the back button is all it takes me to return me to the page. But the advertiser, who pays per click with programs like Google AdSense and Yahoo Publisher Network, has been saddled with the cost of my clumsiness.

Since a lot of what’s categorized as click fraud could be due to butterfingered clicking, Google has made a tweak to AdSense in an effort to reduce the number of clicks which will convert poorly for advertisers. Google has confined the clickable region in AdSense ads to the link itself; previously, the entire boxed region could be clicked.

In addition to waging an ongoing battle with fraudster publishers, Google most certainly has to make a concession to advertisers, who, faced with ever-increasing bid prices for placement, have begun to wonder if they could be getting a better deal with Google’s competitors. It’s a small but important gesture that Google only wants its advertisers to pay for genuinely interested leads, instead of those who accidentally stumbled upon an ad intimately embedded in content.

Here’s an illustration of the change:

YieldBuild met with big blog networks, ad networks, beginning bloggers and others at BlogWorld and New Media Expo, in Las Vegas, November 8-9, 2007.



We were there to explain the value of YieldBuild to sites interested in increasing their text ad revenue, and to give out t-shirts and iPod Nanos to our on-site cheerleaders!



Wanted to win an iPod but weren’t tapped or weren’t at the show? You have until Friday night to try for a new iPod Touch! See the rules here.

Blog on YieldBuild and automatically enter yourself into our Trackback Contest! Prize: A new iPod Touch!

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Contest begins Thursday, November 8th at 12:01 am (Pacific time) and ends Friday, November 16th at 11:59 pm (Pacific time).

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UPDATE: Congratulations to Anita Cohen-Williams at WebMuncher, winner of the contest!

Google must realize that owners of sites with hundred, thousands, or even more pages want to optimize their AdSense formats, but it’s impractical to tweak code and continually redeploy it on the site (even if that’s semiautomated through includes). AdSense has just launched an ad format customization console to its service, giving publishers the ability to change their ad formats without having to touch code already installed on their sites.

While this will certainly help those who would like to test appearance variants with substantially less effort, there are a couple of limitations: you can not switch ad sizes and formats, and you can not delete ads. And, naturally, the console-responsive code must be newly generated and deployed; old code will retain the old functionality only. However, being able to see changes reflected on your site within 10 minutes without getting mired in code gives publishers greater freedom to test visual characteristic variants at will.

I would expect Google will build functionality to support testing size, formats and placement from its console in time, since they are very important in optimizing a page’s AdSense revenue.