Adsense has long been one of the best ways to monetize your website but it's amazing how many people are leaving so much potential earnings on the table simply by not thinking about how and where they place their Google ads. In this article I go through some simple changes that you can make to your ads that will have a huge impact on the commissions you'll receive from Google.

Use the full allowance of ads available to you on each page

Google allows you to place 3 different regular ad units and 1 link ad unit on each and every page of your website and it is important to use this allowance to maximize your chances of clicks. Place them in area's of the page that your visitors will be looking. For example, if your page has an article, place them to float within the text of the article. Either at the top of after a couple of paragraphs. Another great place to place ads is at the bottom of an article as your visitors are looking for a place to go once they've finished reading the article. Why not then present them with some options in the form of some adsense ads. The key is to blend them into the page so they don't detract from the content. Another thing to add here is don't use the horizontal banner ad format. Your site visitors are blind to them and simply won't click on them. This removes one of the 4 allowed ads on your page.

Optimize each page for adsense

Research competitive keywords using a keyword research tool such as Overture's keyword suggestion tool at http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ or grab a list of the most popular keywords from various sources and use them in your web site pages where relevant. There is a great article at - http://searchenginewatch.com/facts/article.php/2156041 - which is a great way to find frequently searched keywords. By using these popular keywords, you're opening the door for Google to place higher paying ads on your website. The more popular the keyword or phrase, the higher AdWords advertisers are generally willing to pay per click. This results in much higher rates of commission for you on each of those clicks.

Use Google's Custom Channels for each of the ad units on your site

Google has provided web site publishers with some great tools to help you analyze and tweak your adsense ads. Give each unit a unique name and then analyze the results and keep tweaking them until you get the desired results from them. If they are not working were they are placed, move them. Try changing the colors and integrating them differently into the text and keep detailed notes on the changes you are making and see which one's make the biggest change to your CTR (Click Through Rate).

Blend you Adsense ads into your web pages

This next tip is one of the simplest changes I made but had a huge effect on my earnings. Make links the same color as your existing text links. Don't try and make the ads stand out on the page by using bright colors as all this achieves is making a big warning sign that these are ads and the majority of people will then not click on the links. By making the links the same color as your links, it looks like they are an extension of your page. If you use the tip above and optimize each page for specific keywords then the ads served on the page will be related to the information on the page and you'll see your CTR shoot up.

Learn from the best

And finally, a tip that I advise for all aspects of website marketing, not just for adsense purposes is, learn from the masters. There are plenty of people making thousands of dollars in adsence earnings every month and have gone through all the trial and error iterations that need to be done to find the most successful way to maximize your adsense earnings. My advice, invest in their courses. They pay for themselves in a very short period of time.