If you haven't yet made the jump to being an online publisher, let me be the first to tell you that you are definitely missing out of the chance of capitalizing on something that can be very profitable for you!



Google AdSense is the most popular pay-per-click program currently online, they have offered pay per click, in one form or another, longer than any other search engine on the net.

They've put a great deal of research and development into their keyword matching to ensure it is a profitable program. Not only have they been around the longest, but they also boast the biggest number of advertisers as well.

Google requires website owners to conform to a number of rules, including:

All pages must have at least one link that leads to it, without concealing pages.

All links must be active and work.

There is a limit of 100 links per page. Creating a hierarchy should keep your navigation clean and well under the link limit.

Tags, especially the 'title' and 'alt' tags should be explanatory and distinct.

When designing your site, create one that is helpful to a user; don't design a page for search engines. Make sure you clearly define what your site is about.

Google forbids hidden text. Don't colorize the text as the same color as your background, or even size the text so small it can't be read. Google has been known to ban publishers who engage in these so called "black hat" techniques.

Google strongly recommends that you include a site map page.

They also strongly recommend you include a robots.txt file in your root directory. The robots.txt file tells website crawlers, like those that will match the ads with your website, which pages not to crawl. This is especially important if you want ads for some but not all of your content or if you have password protected pages.

Following the website design rules doesn't make you bullet-proof, though. Even if you follow all of them, you may still be at risk of losing your AdSense account permanently or even temporarily.

If you are indeed banned by Google to display AdSense advertisements on your page, you can file a re-inclusion request. Although not very successful many times, it still gives a publisher a chance to get back into the program.

Here's what you'll need to include in your re-inclusion request:

Your account name

Your contact information

A list of changes you've made to fix any violations

A guarantee it won't happen again

Reports and evidence of click bombing, if you have any (more on this below)

You should NOT include any threats to pull your business. Visit http://www.google.com/support/bin/request.py to contact customer support. Keep your email straightforward. The subject of your email should be "Re-inclusion Request" to make sure it gets to the right desk.

Click Bombing

Click bombing is when someone clicks on one or more of the ads that appear on your webpage repeatedly.

While this seems like a great way to increase your profits, it is against Google's policy and they are always searching for click bombers. While you can't prevent malicious click bomb attacks, you can take steps to defend yourself should you be accused of it.

Consider investing in a third party tracking software program that is approved by Google. Look for one that tracks IP addresses.

Run reports often, and keep them stored separately from your Google account. Should you be removed from the AdSense program, you won't necessarily have access to run reports.

If or when you are removed or fined by Google for AdSense abuse, make sure you send copies of your IP address reports along with your re-inclusion request.

As mentioned before, even if you follow all the rules of appeal and properly request a re-inclusion, you are not guaranteed a reversal. It seems most requests to be reinstated are not acted upon by Google.

Google's policy has been always one of "protecting the advertiser by any means necessary". Unfortunately, this may mean kicking a legitimate publisher out of the program needlessly if they've been targeted by a malicious person.

Earnings Calculations

So how much money can be made in the AdSense program? Publishers can earn A LOT. From 10 cents a day, to over one hundred thousand dollars a day. Of course this is all dependant on how much traffic your website gets as well as how well you integrate the advertisements. But how does Google calculate per click how much that you, the publisher, gets paid? This is the fuzziest of all gray areas in the AdSense program. Google admittedly doesn't disclose revenue share or whether the ads appearing on your site are cost-per-impression or cost-per-click. What they do tell you is how many page impressions (ads shown), number of clicks on the ads, page click through rate (CTR) and your earnings. Increase your impressions, number of clicks or CTR, and your earnings will follow.

Alternatives

If you've been removed from AdSense or are just looking for another option, there are a few to choose from:

Yahoo! Publisher Network is very similar to AdSense. Experienced webmasters who have used both Google and Yahoo! programs believe Yahoo! is second best, but still a very good, profitable program. As it becomes more popular, more advertisers will jump on board with Yahoo thus creating a PPC race with Google.

Chitika ? A pay per click advertising stream. They don't have as many or such a variety as AdSense or Yahoo!, but are usually less expensive to advertise on.

AdBrite is very similar to Chitika, though slightly smaller.

There you have it in a nutshell, utilizing Google's AdSense program to increase your own profits truly does make "cents"..and dollars. How much you can earn is dependant on how much targeted traffic you can get to your site as well as how well you can integrate the advertisements in the site design as well. Get on board today and start making money!