Adsense Ad Settings

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   eugbugposted 7 years ago

   Are ad settings totally controlled by HubPages or do the settings in my Adsense account have a bearing on what will be displayed? If so, is it a good idea to select categories relevant to a niche site?

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      TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

      I don't know, but I doubt we would have a choice.  If we did, obviously placing ads that match our niches would be a great idea.
      
      I switched to Adsense two days ago and am having trouble trying to figure out my earnings in terms of whether I am getting more or less than I was getting before.
      
      Also, I realized that while HP pays out at $50, Adsense only pays out at$100...so by switching, my income for the first month (and possibly more) may get messed up.
      
      Am I doing something wrong?

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         eugbugposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         If you select Performance Reports > Common Reports > Entire Account Per Day then pick a date range for the period before you turned off the Ad Program, this should give your daily earnings (this gives total earnings across all accounts on which you use Adsense. I don't know how to separate accounts and also show earnings for each day). Then compare your current earnings with that. However this of course won't tell you what extra you are earning now with more Adsense ads displayed, over and above what you would have earned with the Ad program turned off.

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            TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

            Too late.  I already turned of the Ad program.  I want to wait and see how it does over the weekend and then decide what I want to do.  So far, I'm not horribly impressed.

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               eugbugposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               Me neither (for yesterday, Thursday, anyway).  Could be a conspiracy to stop us all turning it off.

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                  TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                  Discovered something interesting.
                  
                  I never paid much attention to Adsense because it paid so little and so slowly, but last night discovered that in order to get full payments you have to verify every account you  have with them...which means every individual niche site where your work is now posted!
                  
                  Easy to do, if you know you're supposed to do it.  Point is that I've been losing adsense income for some time now without realizing it!
                  
                  BTW...had a VERY good day Saturday with Adsense so may stick with it for awhile.

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                     Jesse Drzalposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                     Do you mean verify the sites here on HP? I asked that a while ago and staff said there is nothing to configure, it's all done for you automatically.

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                        TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                        No.  You configure them on the Adsense site.  I wouldn't have known about this if they had not posted a warning.  You have to manually add and verify every site where your hubs are posted...aka...niche sites as well as any HP sites you have created.  Just takes a minute, but I didn't know I had to do this.

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                           Jesse Drzalposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                           Ok, I understand. Everything on HP is taken care of as far as the Ad program but your own personal Adsence you have to configure if you choose to opt out then.

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                     eugbugposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                     I notice that some niche sites are listed in "Manage Sites", but not all. So either I manually added sites (don't remember doing this) or they were automatically added, but a HubPages bug prevented all of them being added. Also I thought verification was only for sites you own? Maybe adding sites is only necessary so that the earnings for each site are itemised, and adding HubPages as a site was the only necessary action we needed to take?

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                        TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                        Apparently this isn't so because Adsense warned me that there were sites earning money that were not listed as mine and advised me to add them.  When I checked, every single one of them was a niche site from HP.
                        
                        Are you still trying Adsense or have you changed back...and has anybody mentioned that cpms have gone back up?

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                           eugbugposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                           I'm still using Adsense and my CPMs haven't changed much since I turned off the Ad Program, but yours might be different and on the rise.
                           Did you add sites by selecting Settings > My Sites and then just click on the "+" button and add URLs to the niche sites?

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                              TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                              Not exactly.  Adsense showed me my verified sites and allowed me to click the + button and manually type in the urls for them.  I'm pretty sure this was under settings, however.  Although I can't legally share what's been happening, I do know that the figures have been 2 to 3 times higher than what I was getting with the HP program, but it's hard to know if CPMs went up or not.  As long as they stay high, I'll stick with it, but I do wish there was a way to look and see what my CPMs are right now without causing problems for myself.

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                              TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                              How do you check your  current CPMs?

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                                 eugbugposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                                 I click on the Earnings tab, then Settings and finally click on the Ad Program Reports link. This shows a few impressions even though the Ad Program is turned off. However I don't really understand how CPM are decided. Are they bid for like clicks and must there be impressions for CPMs to even exist?

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                                    TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                                    CPM means cents per thousand views and is the amount of money an advertiser is willing to spend to have his ads placed on your hubs.  Advertisers bid on these.  So every time your hub gets 1000 page views, you get 60% of the amount of money that was paid out. 
                                    
                                    CPMs change regularly due to competition, etc., so at times they are higher or lower than at other times.  In my case they generally go up in the summer season because that is when people tend to read more of my articles and down in colder weather because people are not thinking about vacations, etc. at those times.
                                    
                                    I wish I understood, however, how Adsense works because yesterday I had much higher views than two days before and yet earned quite a bit less.  Clearly it's not based on page views and I have yet to find a simple explanation for the formula they use.
                                    
                                    I did OK with them this week but will now switch back for the next week to see if I can figure out which way is best.

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                                       chasmacposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                                       How many clicks did you get 2 days before compared to yesterday? That could account for the difference.

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                                          TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                                          Don't know.  I've tried to compare and analyze but there are so many ways to look at this that I gave up.  I'm back on HP for now but had a fairly good week with Adsense, so am happy.  May just change back and forth from time to time...not sure yet!

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                  3. 76

                     chasmacposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                     As a recent Admin post mentioned, you shouldn't have to manually add niche sites to Adsense; it should happen automatically. And that's certainly been true in my own case. I've never had to add any as they're all already there in my Adsense account. I just checked now on one hub that was moved to Holidappy a few days ago - my only one on that site, and sure enough it's there in Adsense. It hasn't earned a single penny yet, but it's there.

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                        TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                        Well guess what?  I had to do it in my case because Adsense advised me to do it.  Don't know why, but that's what happened.  They simply were not there.

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                           Jesse Drzalposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                           Yes if the team thinks they are there automatically..they are not. I'm across 5 or 6 niche sites and the ''My Sites'' section on Adsence was empty.

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                           chasmacposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                           Yes, I know, and no doubt that's why the  admin  chose the word "shouldn't", implying that there may be cases, such as yours, where it's necessary to do it manually.

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                              Jesse Drzalposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                              Gotcha. The problem is everyone isn't going to see every thread like that in forums..that info needs to be on site somewhere where people can find it, no?

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                        eugbugposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                        Not all my niche sites were itemised in Adsense and I had to add them manually? Possibly this was because I didn't earn any pure Adsense income from them with the Adsense Program turned off.

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                        ChristinSposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                        Agreed, I never added them either, they just showed up.  Interesting.

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                        Patkayposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                        Hi, how do I check if mine have been added automatically?

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                           theraggededgeposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                           Go here and log in to your Adsense account: www.google.com/adsense/

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                              Patkayposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                              Thanks a lot for the help, 2 of my niche site have already been added.

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         Marisa Wrightposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         If you choose or disallow categories on your Adsense account, it will have an effect on HubPages, but only when your Adsense ID is showing on the page. When HubPages ID is showing, their choices would apply.
         
         Remember, though, that having ads relevant to your article isn't necessarily what you want.  Adsense used to do that.  Then they worked out they (and we) could make more money by displaying ads based on the reader's interests, not on what the article is about.  We may think it's annoying or doesn't look right - but let's face it, Adsense wouldn't stick with that idea if it wasn't making a bigger profit.

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   Jesse Drzalposted 7 years ago

   It would be helpful if staff would hop on and give us some nuts and bolts clarifications. We all need to make sure our earnings we are entitled to are gathered correctly.

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      eugbugposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Hang on, I'll just press this!
      
      

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         Jesse Drzalposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         Yes!! Ha ha..

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   NateB11posted 7 years ago

   I've wondered about this myself because I got a notice in my Adsense account that I should allow certain ads to increase revenue, something to that effect. I didn't do it because I'm not clear how this would affect my HP account.

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      Jesse Drzalposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Yes, this is good to know, definitely. I'm assuming the Hubpages main site needs to be pasted in as well as all niche sites involved.

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   theraggededgeposted 7 years ago

   I've switched for about five days now and Adsense daily amounts are equal to HP's before the recent slide.

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      TIMETRAVELER2posted 7 years agoin reply to this

      It's hard to figure this out because you always get some money from Adsense anyhow.  My Adsense figures were quite good, but with pageview variations being so high, it's hard to tell.  Today, event though I switched back, Adsense is still earning well.  I don't understand it unless it takes time for the switch to take place.

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   TeriSilverposted 7 years ago

   In the 7 or so years I've written for HP, I've never understood Google's Adsense, and I've never gotten any money from them.  Any earnings I've had have come from HubPages ad program, and a few from eBay, back in the day.  If I could figure it out, it would be a good thing and I do, or used to, have an accumulating figure there on the site, although I can't find it now.  The questions I have are:  Is it either HP's ad program or Google's Adsense (or both) and how in the world does this Google program work because none of their "tutorials" are all that easy to follow when they change everything, especially; and I spend enough time in the writing, researching and editing processes that trying to figure this out has just always been a problem.  Will I ever get any money from them or is it a giant rip-off?  Rant over, time for breakfast.

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   TeriSilverposted 7 years ago

   And, reading through this thread, I see i am not alone in this confusion.  So I ask the HP brass to create (or send) some insight for all of us.

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      theraggededgeposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      I bet you have accumulated some money on Adsense, Teri Try to log in to Adsense with your Google/Gmail account. https://www.google.com/adsense/

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      Jesse Drzalposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      You are still earning in Adsence, albeit peanuts so to speak, because even though you use HP's ad program there is still a Google Adsence ad being displayed I believe.

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7. 92

   TeriSilverposted 7 years ago

   Ok, so it seems that in 7 plus years on HP I have $17.55 in Adsense which I would never receive until after I'm dead, given their $100 payday minimum. And I do see several of the niche site pages listed, but to see all of them, they're on another page and they are not all showing activity which I find a bit suspect.  In any case, it all has lots of stats that I don't understand or probably care about ... I wish we could have a better payout through HubPages' ad program or that it can pull the Google amounts so we can get paid from them too.  $100 payout is OK for high volume vendors but not for someone like me.

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      NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

      I'm thinking something must be wrong if you haven't had a payout from Adsense in 7 years. I mean, it can take awhile but not that long. I looked at your profile and you have a decent amount of articles and they are well-written, so not sure why you haven't hit the threshold. I mean, maybe it could take a few years, but not as long as it's taking you.

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      psycheskinnerposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      It sounds like you need to opt out of adsense and join hubads, which pays through the main hubpages sytem.

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   TeriSilverposted 7 years ago

   I do get payments from HubPages every few months, when I hit $50.  But no, nothing ever from Google.

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      psycheskinnerposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Well if you are already in Hubads, then hardly any adsense ads appear on your pages--hence they do not earn very much.

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   Marisa Wrightposted 7 years ago

   I'm late to this thread, but to clear up the confusion:
   
   When you set up Adsense, you get a message recommending that you set up "verified sites". It's a safeguard in case someone steals one of your articles and posts it on, say, a porn or gambling site - because if Adsense thought YOU did that, you might lose your Adsense account.
   
   I'm guessing that quite a few of you obeyed that message and then forgot about it! 
   
   However, what that means is that if your Adsense ID appears on a site that's not "verified", Adsense will ignore it. So, every time you start a new blog or join a new site (like the niche sites), you have to go and add them to your list of verified sites.  Otherwise, Adsense will ignore them and you won't earn a cent from them.
   
   The good news is, as TT2 found, that Adsense will usually tell you if your Adsense is appearing on other sites, and give you the chance to add them.  Just log into your Adsense account and check your messages. 
   
   Also go and check "My Sites" on your Adsense account, and make sure each site has a GREEN tick next to it.
   
   If you're not getting any messages and the niche sites are appearing automatically, then you didn't set up verified sites.  Which means your ID is valid on any site, any time.

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    Sherry Hewinsposted 7 years ago

    I have disabled my HP Ad program and am earning only from AdSense for about a week now. I had an immediate rise in earnings, on AdSense (but of course my HP earning went to almost 0).
    
    One thing I have noticed is that the earnings are a lot more volatile on AdSense. Some days I earn double or triple my average day. I love to look at all of the information AdSense gives on which sites are making money, how much per click and so forth.
    
    When I started this, Healdove was down in the dumps. That was a large part of my views and earnings. In the past week, it has bounced back significantly. That makes it hard to tell whether my higher earnings are due to that as opposed to switching programs.
    
    Anyway, I am going to keep the change going, at least for the month of May. If things continue as they are, that should enable me to reach payout on the AdSense account. Also, that will give me a better basis for comparison if I switch back.

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