Gushing Pixels since 2009
Good afternoon. I thought I ought to share some of the pictures I took while wandering around in Banff and the various mountains.
As I have said to everyone: mountains are too large to consider them with and sense of scale.
And of course. It was prettiest in the mornings:
More pictures later.
CjEggett
A strange feeling. Next: Banff.
Does changing Google adsense keywords on a site in some areas damage adsense across the whole site?
Recently I have “hardcoded” some keywords for the Google adsense for a site. As the site is mainly user generated content this is one way to have tighter control over the kind of adsense ads which are showing.
Adsense uses contextual advertising and, as such, is for the most part playing catch-up to what is actually on the page.
You might ask why this is the best was to control adsense; after all, doesn’t Google work it all out based on the page content for you?
Sadly not.
Users do not necessarily talk about what they want. In most cases the opposite is true – they spark a debate with a question. It is their lack of knowing what they want which causes them to write anything at all. This is problematic for the Adsense system – it has to guess at what is actually desired by the user of the sites. And it’s chances of getting it right are really quite low.
I, on the other-hand, think I know a reasonable amount about our users – and their desires. The code tells Google to pick ads based on the keywords I have manually entered – rather than that which appears on the page. I have begun this process on some areas of the site (those which currently do not make a great deal of money) and it does seem they are performing better.
The Good:
These areas which are performing better have previously had high traffic and low click prices. Now there has been a 100% profit increase. This was achieved by simply requesting higher cost keywords. As this area also has a large amount of “blindess” we have allowed graphical google ads as well as text. This will temporarily knock the blindess away from these users and has pushed up the CTR (click through rate).
The Bad:
There have been some negative effects as well. The areas which were previous making a great deal of money have been cut by 50%. As the top earning areas have been hit hard so the overall profit has been slashed by around 10%.
Several theories why this is so:
1. When we coded in the keywords we gave google a “prod” and received a new box of creepy crawly spiders poured over our heads. This would mean the content on the pages has dictated particularly acurrate ads. This is no good because, as we mentioned above, people aren’t always talking about the soloution – in fact they are mroe likely to be talking about the problem.
Given time this might “settle” back into familiar and high earning patterns.
2.There is a google conspiracy against our site. Google is watching our movements and attempting to thwart us at every turn. This is quite unlikely!
3. There has been a change to the way adsense is delivered – possibly due to a new social media bias. Maybe now the freshest content has more weight compared to the old. “Fresh” becomes king and therefore dictates ads more specifically targeted.
While I currently have no solution for the situation I will report back once I do understand how to win back that orginal 50% – if there is anything for me to do at all!
Note: As I read more about Search Engine Optimization I have decided to write up the various thoughts which may cross my mind. They are unlikely to very insightful at this stage – but eventually I may say something useful!
Currently I have been reading about User Generated Content (UGC) and I came across Bill Slawski’s enlightening articles “How Search Engines May Rank User Generated Content”. In this article Bill outlines some of the problems with UGC and the ways in which Google and Bing may consider UGC for ranking.
The problems with User Generated Content identified by Bill Slawski are:
1. User Generated Content tends to be fairly short.
2. There usually aren’t links to or from UCG.
3. Spelling mistakes tend to be common in UCG.
The question is, how do we fix these problems with User Generated Content? How do we make User Generated Content better? As we have little or no control over the content submitted to our sites (beyond manually sub-editing all submitted content, and on larger sites this is almost impossible as well as costly). We must rely on other methods to encourage users to create worthy content.
All of the above problems can be overcome by the implementation of user tools.
1. User Generated Content tends to be fairly short.
There is no direct answer for this but one way to tackle this issue would be to offer supplementary ways of submitting information. For example: if you ran a questions and answers site on which users sometimes offer advice in a single convoluted paragraph you may want to offer a “list,” option to supplement their comment. A list could be seen as an optional extra for the users – but one which those helping out would actually use to clarify their argument. In the same way Twitter occasionally forces people to rethink the way they are saying something by imposing a 140 character limit, a list can help users rethink the information they are offering.
Taking the time to think over your post is a luxury most users don’t usually take, so anything which may slow down the process will produce better content. Even those user who do want to look through their work for errors will be less likely to find them in the time-frame they’ve got between writing and posting (No user wants to be late on an issue – the thread of a conversation may well have moved on). To avoid this “edit blindness” the implementation of a “preview,” feature which changes the format and view of the entered data. Changing the width of the page or the text box is one way to shake the blindness from users. This helps the user look at their work afresh and edit more effectively – users will be grateful for the service and you gain better quality content.
2. There usually aren’t links to or from UCG
UGC doesn’t necessarily have links in it. Two ways to gain links in UGC is: become a publisher/warehouser of content or offer spaces for links as a matter of course – much like Digg or any other sharing application.
It is well known that most, when left with a silence in a conversation, will try and fill it. Applying this logic to links is worthwhile. Offering some “link space,” – empty fields which ask to be filled with a link – might be one way to encourage linking.
To be linked to you need to have interesting content. You mostly have to rely on user for this. The ability for users to enrich their content with pictures and videos (as well as lists and the like as mentioned before) is one way to encourage high-quality content.
3. Spelling mistakes tend to be common in UCG.
The simple answer to this is to create and maintain a spell-checker of some sort. One which works actively as the message is typed is more likely to yield better content. This also helps reduce user frustrations. Nothing is worse for a user than their ability to communicate being compromised and therefore misunderstood by other uses. The internet is a dangerous place for misinterpretation at the best of times!
Limiting spelling-mistakes will ultimately return better quality content from users.
Limiting these issues is one way to improve the quality of content which is already be offered.
Bill goes on to talk about the other various ways that the major search engines rank user generated content – but this was a little out of my depth. While I understand the concepts I have little or no knowledge about the technical side; I thought it best to leave that for a later blog post (i.e. when I know what I am talking about).
A little sunshine today – not for long of course! The lake is still frozen but it has becomes rough due to thawing, raining and refreezing.
Some pictures:
Have a good day.
CjEggett
This is my second attempt to resize a picture for the blog using html tags. I have been informed that the picture should resize if I enter only one instruction in the tage (i.e. Width=400).
An attempt:
Hope it works!
Presents under the tree. Ready for tomorrow. A few drinks later just to make sure santa doesn’t wake me this evening.
Hoorah!
Spent the day wandering about in the cold and poking a fire. It is a good fire. It is also a good day. The coal in the fire seems to burn a little quicker than I remeber.
The lake is partly frozen over today. There are a few confused birds. They’ll catch on eventually I’m sure.
The bridge is falling down a little. This is not exactly problematic as it doesn’t really go anywhere in particular. It has been falling apart for quite some time. We should fix it one day.
The birds were confused but probably not concerned.
It is pretty in winter. In fairness it is pretty all the time.
Merry Christmas! I must go wrap some presents now.
All the best,
Chris.
Do you know what a snow hill driver is? Now is your chance. I will now provide a short crash-course in snow-hill drivers and snow-hill driving.
The snow-hill is a unusual thing to catch sight of in great britian. The uk as a rule does not get much snow. When we do we are ill prepared for the experience.
This combination of unpredictable snow and confusion when confronted with such alien white stuff leads to what i have termed “snow-hill driving”
First example:
Second example:
As you can see snow-hill drivers are those who decide that, rather than removing snow from their car the best solution is to create a small sweep across their window with the wiper.
Adequate? Maybe. A thing to interest someone in a traffic jam, certainly.
It is looking good out there. More snow updates later I hope. Certainly a couple of inches out there. I hope it stays for a while.
