Google Adsense is a top stream of income for many sites, including mine, but many bloggers are scared of using it because of bad experiences with spammy, non family-friendly advertisers. And let’s face it, most of us are tired of the “10 Rules of a Flat Stomach” ads!
While not foolproof, there are some things you can do to control your Google Adsense ads to keep the bad stuff out. The first tip is to block certain categories of ads.
To block ads in a particular category from appearing on your site, login to your Adsense account and click on the Adsense Setup tab at the top.
Once you’re on the Adsense Setup page, you’ll see an area for Category Filters. It also shows what percentage of your recent earnings were generated by blockable categories that were not previously blocked, so that you can see if you would be blocking a category that creates a significant portion of income.
You can select up to 8 of these categories to filter. (Bloggers who already have category filters set up – previously there was a limit of 5, but in preparing this post I discovered I could block an additional three more for a total of eight.)
Select the ones you want to block and click submit. That’s it! No more laser hair removal or 10 Secrets of a Flat Stomach ads (that is, if you chose to filter Cosmetic Procedures & Body Modification and Weight Loss categories). These settings will apply to all the ad slots that are setup in your Adsense account; you can’t choose different filters for different channels.
Now, you can run Google Adsense and not have readers email you to complain about the content they’re seeing on your ads! There are still some sites that don’t fit into these categories that you may want to keep from appearing on your site – look for another post soon on how to block specific URLs in Google Adsense!
Carrie Isaac blogs about coupons and deals local to Colorado Springs at Springs Bargains, and handles internet marketing for her husband, a Colorado Springs Realtor.
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Thank you for this great article. It only took me a few minutes to filter my adsense settings.
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I would love to do this for my sites, but unfortunately I don’t have that option on my adsense account. I don’t know if it’s because my account has yet to earn much or if it just doesn’t receive enough traffic? I tried looking in the Google Help section, but there seems to be no answer for it.
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Just FYI, Google changed the name of the tab for the category filters. It is now called “Ad Review Center.”
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I’m having a tough time too. I’m not able to find either tab, “AdSense Set Up” or “Ad Review Center.” Maybe it’s because I’m working through Blogger?
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Thank you so much for this information. It took a little looking around my site to find the filter, but I did it. As a new blogger, I feel like I’m crawling my way through the process, and you all are a tremendous help.
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Whoops! Sorry about missing the step between the Adsense setup tab and the Category filters.
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wow! i just have to say that my earnings are way up the past couple of days since i implemented this technique. thanks.
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Thanks for the great tip. I have gotten rid of some ads I really didn’t like.
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What I really want to know is if anyone has made any real money from Adsense?? I am considering removing it altogether.
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Mommy Snacks Reply:
January 18th, 2010 at 1:43 pm
Lynn, Adsense has been very profitable for me with a few changes I made last year. We have a post coming up with someone sharing about ad placement with adsense. That made all the difference in the world for me. Do you have adsense for feeds activated? That helps a little for feed reader revenue, at least.
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