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.
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Mommy Snacks Reply:
January 18th, 2010 at 1:43 pm
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