We are getting close to putting out a new ad layout that should improve earnings for authors, while creating more separation of ads from the content.
For authors, the most significant change is there will be a 728X90 above the title and the 468X60 (under the title) will be removed along with one link unit. We will be monitoring earnings closely and believe this will be good for authors and readers.
We will continue to watch this tweak and may make more changes in the near future. We'll keep you posted.
-Paul
Hope it helps cause things are really sinking fast. Traffic and CTR are really suffering.
Was just going to say that it seems to be getting worse!
google.com traffic is almost non existent now!
I personally haven't noticed a drop in traffic or CTR.
I'm glad that HubPages is being proactive about the ads and layout.
good to know. thanks for keeping us posted on this.
I have just checked my hubs, it is good to see that 468X60 (under the title) is gone now. But I don't see any 728X90 ads above the title.
How to bring that ad unit?
You need to be signed out to see the unit.
I signed out and don't see any banners, just the 350xwhatever to the right of the first paragraph.
Thanks. It's OK now (after signed out)
Why the ad unit 728X90 is visible only after signed out? (because I am seeing other units when logged in)
I just went and changed the ads on my hubs. Mostly, I am glad that HubPages is working to keep this site going and helping us at the same time.
Thanks Paul and all of the Hubpages Staff for helping all of us improve our hubs and earning. You are doing a wonderful job Hubpages Team!!
Just caught up with this thread. I find the conversation interesting, because for me, my Amazon is doing about the same as before, it is my Adsense and Ebay that have nosedived compared to before. I am systematically lowering the amount of items in my product capsules however, in most of them, I am just giving my readers specific choices of items that I am discussing in my hub. I almost never use news capsules at all, and use link capsules to link to related hubs primarily.
And while my overall traffic is down, I am still getting about 90% of my traffic from search engines Google being about 73%. The percentages haven't changed too much, more just the overall volume and income.
Not sure how to take it all, or whether the fixes mentioned so far really will fix things. None of my other sites have been affected hardly at all.
Sir, With all due respect, my earnings dropped tremendously after you removed the ad unit just under the title and the other link unit
I have to say that I kind of doubted this was a good move.. BUT today I earned a few bucks from just three clicks!
I was use to this before the algorithm change but to go from earning zero to a few cents the past few days to this big jump is a good look for the new layout.
It is just one day but I'll have to wait and see if the earnings are higher tomorrow as well.
Interesting, I have seen much higher click through rates with this method, but I tend to avoid it because I can never get teh ad spot to look 'right'.
Look forward to seeing how it works for us on Hubpages though (I am sure it is going to be great!)
It's always appreciated of HP trying to make things for better. But I am not seeing any ads above the title. I logged out and in, still nothing. $0 adsense for the past couple of days which is very usual for me. I wonder whether it is a rare coincidence or it's been affected by HP ads program or it is the new layout thing? Absolutely no ads on the top
Has this taken place? I haven't seen anything above the title, even with the full banner ads gone. Confused
I've noticed Google traffic falling off too. Hope this new change with ad positions on top helps with earnings. Thanks to all HP staff for always trying to stay on top of things. No pun intended.
Removing the 468X60 ads (under the title) is OK. But can you please bring back the horizontal link unit in the middle of the hub?
The horizontal link can still be put in, just put a picture in the center of your text.
Yup, still no horizontal link...I checked all of my hubs. Sigh.........
I second the motion. Please bring back the horizontal link in the middle of the hub!!!!
Thanks for the heads up! Just noticed that the layout is different, when a person inquires our hubs/sites now. It doesn't seem to look as professional, and our site pictures don't show up...when you press hub inquiry? Hopefully it is all for the betterment of the writer? Be looking for the changes you mentioned:)
Paul, I read in Ren's blog, Things to Help Your Hubs that you left a comment saying "Hard to say this is the exact thing bringing them back, but overall, I think it’s good to significantly reduce syndicated content on Hubs."
I was thinking about that before I came across your comment. My own thoughts are that the news capsule can make it look to Google like copied text. So I agree with you. I'd rather not include news capsules at this point.
Thanks Paul. Looking forward to seeing how the changes add up. Really appreciate the work the HP team has done in an attempt to increase quality, as well as our $$$$$ stats. Hoping for a long happy HP relationship.
Yes. We ran several tests and Hubs that used Amazon were the most likely to see a decrease in traffic, followed by the news capsule. We can only guess at the reasons, but it's possible that it looks like copied content, possibly resembles a scraped site, and could have an ad to content ratio that is to heavily weighted toward ads that the new algorithm doesn't like as much. Again, just possible theories. However, we are pretty sure that if the content engages the reader, the search engines will come around.
With all of the HubPages tests, and the new algorithm in mind: Can Youtube video's cause performance deline as well? Possibly registering as copied content in the same manner?
Hmm that's pretty sad if that is the reason... Amazon pays me more often than eBay and the News capsules are pretty handy.
Pretty much ALL my hubs have Amazon and News capsules on them...
I'd like a little more research before I decide to switch everything.
Today I made 7 cents from Adsense, 5 cents yesterday... uhhh yeah. I'm use to a couple bucks.
Only made a dime from Amazon the past week.
And I haven't made a single cent through eBay this month.
My traffic is down like 300 page views a day than what I'm use to but does that really explain the drop in the click through rate? I mean I'm still getting 500-800 views a day...
I was pulling in on average around $75 a month from adsense, now I'll be lucky to hit $50
I don't think this new layout is working that well so far but I hope you guys can figure something out... I'll keep watching the forums to see what might be bringing down views.
I'm beginning to think no one's results are typical. My Adsense is up and down but on pace to at least make the $100 payout easily with my few hubs. Amazon is crazy with a bunch of sales every so often with days with zero sales in between.
Fortunately, there are a good ratio of $200+ sales amongst the $40-$100 items. Still, traffic is down about 1/3.
Only HP knows how well the new ad program works on my hubs.
Well personally I'm loving the HP ad program... it pays every day because I'm always getting hits to my hubs. And in fact, I think it might actually end up paying me more than Adsense use to even before the algorithm change. Which is a big plus!
But what I'm looking at here is my three big earners... eBay, Amazon and Adsense. The new HP ad program is here to stay for me... it's a big winner. But should I keep the other 3... I'm thinking not.
So far this year eBay has only earned me $23.92 with a very low earning per click... it's sucked in a TON of clicks (some of which convert to zero sales) What would that look like if those were all Google clicks? I'd say a good amount of money.
Then we have Amazon.. I've earned $153.80 with them so far this year with a decent earning per click... 3 TIMES what eBay is giving me! Sure, it sucked in more than twice the clicks compared to eBay BUT I earned more than 6 times the amount of money with Amazon. So I think I might just hold onto them.
But let's take a look at Adsense... I've made $162.64 with them so far this year. And the beauty is there's no commitment for the reader other than clicking... there is ALWAYS an earning per click.
In light of recent events I'm seriously considering dropping all eBay capsules from my Hubs and seeing what happens. If anyone has thoughts on this then let me know.
Here are my earnings from last year to give you a better idea:
eBay: $94.20
Amazon: $160.40
Adsense: $661.31
And the new HP ad program is on track to outdo anything I had with Adsense... it only makes sense to drop the weakest link, right?
(Like I kicked Kontera to the curb ages ago)
I just logged out to have a look around. The new layout looks good on my newly revised hubs. The large unit above the title had some good ads on it.
I should have said thank you to Paul as well. It looks like hubbers all over the US from San Francisco to Cape Cod are up late working away. (And on a Friday night!)
thank you paul, these are trying times- though I think for me as a smaller earner things are holding up- google uk traffic is soaring to make the gap up and earnings are remaining fairly constant with the added bonus of the HP programme . (small time for me but it is real and increases every day)
I am thinking of taking amazon links off a couple of history hubs but they are there really to help the reader if they want to take the subject forward- so maybe its a wait and see game.
Nice to see all the changes from HP, especially those to prevent duplicated content and low quality
when you say 'amazon links', do you mean the ones that take people to a specific book etc ... I've got those on all my hubs and wonder if they need removing ?
Thank you, Paul. I just finished getting rid of my excess amazon links. Good thing I only have a few hubs. Thanks again for looking after us.
I should say thank you as well. Now, at least there are some hints what should we do next.
Thanks Paul. This is very exciting news and I'm looking forward to the change.
Any idea how long it will take before we see the benefits from these changes?
I have nothing above my title. Is there something that I have to do?
Thank You so much Paul for any help with earnings and views will be grearly appreciated. As it is now, both views and earnings really Stink.
I guess I have to change ALL of my hubs and locate the photo to the center in order for this to work???
Thanks Paul and to Hubpages for looking at ways to improve our sites. As with anything, it takes time and the tweaks are evident during this time.
I appreciate that Hubpages listens to the community and is making such improvements.
Cheers Paul. These ads look great on websites at the top bar, and it would look cool at the top part of a hub. Ever thought of doing something with dividers that could have a mini-ad on them or as part of the divider? Just wondering. But any improvements at this point are gladly welcomed! A Big Thanks for this Cheeky Girl!
I'd only recommend adding an amazon product when it's critical to the content of a Hub. For example, if you're reviewing a product or book it makes sense to add the product. Another way it makes sense to add a product is when you are describing how to do a project and you list the items needed to complete the project.
If it's not a perfect fit, I'd suggest leaving them out. We have several authors that haven't seen their traffic drop, they rarely use amazon, links capsules and news capsules.
Got anything else for us
Thanks for the update!
Paul, when you refer to link capsules does this include capsules which only link internally?
And how about RSS feed which display "latest hubs", what should be done with those?
I saw a gigantic ad where the 728X90 goes over the fold. Ray Charles couldn't miss it!
Hi, my ads are no longer showing even after a log out. Only thing i see are side middle ads to the right. I don't know what else to do! I spent the last two weeks before this new announcement fixing and trying to get ads on the middle page and now all this seems to be gone.
I had noticed there were not as many ads on my pages. My ctr has dropped quite a bit today as a result. Hopefully it will improve.
There's a Catch 22 here
=> Reduce the number and Prominence of Google ads to increase rankings on Google and to overcome the low quality tag for hubpages.
=> Fewer and less prominent ads will reduce income from the ads
My pages have only a side ad and a mid page ad - nothing near the Title - this will dramatically reduce earnings!!!
How do we know that the new layout will not greatly reduce earnings of 'good quality' pages that still appear in Google search results on page 1?
Aren't all authors being 'punished' by having their earning potential for 'good' pages reduced to deal with the 'low quality issues?
More changes
The adsense block now appears above the title after you log out, but the major ad to the side has gone.
The layout now closely resembles Ezinearticles.com - which went down the gurgler after Panda sat on it!
Where is all this heading? Will it work?
The change in Ad layout was done to increase potential CTR, not to improve SERPS rankings. As per the original post, which states as such. So I'm not really sure what kind of answer you want, asides from the answer that has already been given?
My concern is that this could reduce SERPS rankings - no hits means no money, despite rise in CTR.
Are the ads too prominent?
Was Ezine penalised because of this layout?
How can we be assured that this will not happen?
I should imagine that the biggest problem with Ezine was its huge quantities of duplicate content. You are talking about a website which produced a Wordpress plugin for people to scrape their entire portfolio of Wordpress content onto their sites. That and the large amount of material which had been produced with article spinners.
But their articles are checked by two humans.
Their layout was identified as a key reason for their demise.
I guess I'm off to delete some Amazon capsules! Here's hoping it works!
Actually i had a few dollars a day earning from adsense ,now its a few day i do not make anything.
Well, I have the horizontal link and I think everything looks good. I'm gonna call today a wash, but I have zero clicks for the first time since... 2009.... and it is pretty sad. Here's to tomorrow, though.
Ryan are you up very late or did you get up early. What time of the morning is it there?
Half four, up late. Now going to sleep.
Its 4.30am, I am up at 9am to visit a small town called Cromer for the third time in two weeks.
In order to take photos, which will be used as a website similar in style but on a smaller scale to yours and bills
Nighty night.
This is so sad...I am clueless about what you are referring to here! I've got a lot of reading to do obviously...
Oh dear,
Just recovered from the new algo and now the hubpages dance begins.
See you in a week then.
Thanks for the update Paul.
I dont understand the reasoning for the change though.
I have to say on visiting hubs after being logged out again. I'm overwhelmed by the spammy quality of the current ads. They are huge, bright, and ugly - apparently part of the new ad campaign. (This isn't bitterness about not profiting from them, I can live quite nicely with adsense earnings on my share of impressions.)
But as I consider bringing a new type of content to HubPages, I have to wonder if my content and visitor is compatible with the visual impact of these ads - and if I want my personal name associated with the quality of those ads. I mean my name and content is there on HPs 40 percent.
Just my two cents for consideration. I know that we're all feeling our way in new territory.
Yeah they're not that targeted to the content.
its a catch33 (?)
=> we and hubpages, want clicks on ads
=> we want readers to like hubpage articles and not see it as junky
=> we want google to like the page and not penalise it.
We need to know that the optimum balance to the layout design has been applied.
This is critical as the layout applies to everyone irrespective of the quality of the content.
I just received an e-mail from HubPages listing 5 of my 104 hubs with excess Amazon links. Even though they gave me until March 25 to remove them, I did so right away. It was much easier to remove the extra Amazon products than to write an additional 50 words per item.
Ok so I guess that requiring us to write 50 words per Hub means 50 overall words in the Hub’s content right guys? Or do we have to describe each product with 50 specific words towards that product only?
Another thing I was wondering, are we suppose to see our publisher ID once we are logged off our hub account?
Because I logged of and was checking the code only to see no pub Id at all, unlike most of the other websites that show both our pub ID and also the client’s pub ID, I'm guessing that HubPages is different right? Can anyone lighten me up please? Thanks.
Your hub must have 50 words for each ad you have, it does not mean each ad needs 50 words of description. For example, if you have 8 Amazon ads, your hub needs to be at least 400 words.
Thanks Paul, good information in this forum and I realized I am not alone with the google stinking right now
Does anyone know if having a news capsule on your hub now has a negative effect on your SERPs position?
I've a news capsule on pretty much all of my hubs and my google.com traffic has vaporised since the algo change.
Am tempted to remove the news capsule altogether..
Hi kiwiton if you can find Paul's post about the news capsule it should answer your questions, either way I copied so I'll past it right here for you
"Paul Edmondson posted 44 hours ago
Yes. We ran several tests and Hubs that used Amazon were the most likely to see a decrease in traffic, followed by the news capsule. We can only guess at the reasons, but it's possible that it looks like copied content, possibly resembles a scraped site, and could have an ad to content ratio that is to heavily weighted toward ads that the new algorithm doesn't like as much. Again, just possible theories. However, we are pretty sure that if the content engages the reader, the search engines will come around."
So In my own words I would simply avoid news capsules, there is no true valuable nature to them unless I would think they are more important than the content we are creating. I would simply avoid them (period).
Thanks HRoger, I think I'll remove the news from my hubs and monitor them for any changes. Any drastic movement up or down and I'll let you all know!
Thanks Paul for the changes
Please bring back the horizontal ad unit after the 1st/2nd capsule. CTR is so low for the past couple of days. I think we need that ad unit back
I am seeing a rise in earnings at the moment, I don't know whether it is the effort I have put in or a return to how things were before Xmas and the Algo..lets hope things are settling!
Same here, some of my old hubs were badly optimized for adsense, and I changed a bunch of them while going through everthing to look at reducing amazon product links, so I don't have a clue how much of my higher ctr and ecpm is due to hubpages changes and how much is due to my own changes.
A quick thank-you for how hard the staff works to keep this site great. All these ad things confuse the heck out of me and I'm sure many hubbers feel the same way.
Me thinks that HP may have shortened the left-side hub width by a couple of characters to make more room on the right side for ads. So if, like me, you tend to take it to the limit; you might want to make a quick check of the vulnerable hubs re: spacing/aesthetics (particularly the titles). I could be wrong.
I prefer the old adsense layout, and I think there should be an equal number of ads for google and hubpages program. For the past 5days that I activated the hubpages ad program my google adsense earning was greatly reduce to 1/4 and even less.
Copyright © 2024 The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers on this website. HubPages® is a registered trademark of The Arena Platform, Inc. Other product and company names shown may be trademarks of their respective owners. The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website.
Copyright © 2024 Maven Media Brands, LLC and respective owners.
As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.
For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy
Show DetailsNecessary | |
---|---|
HubPages Device ID | This is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons. |
Login | This is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service. |
Google Recaptcha | This is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy) |
Akismet | This is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Google Analytics | This is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Traffic Pixel | This is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized. |
Amazon Web Services | This is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy) |
Cloudflare | This is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Hosted Libraries | Javascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy) |
Features | |
---|---|
Google Custom Search | This is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Maps | Some articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Charts | This is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy) |
Google AdSense Host API | This service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Google YouTube | Some articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Vimeo | Some articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Paypal | This is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Login | You can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Maven | This supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy) |
Marketing | |
---|---|
Google AdSense | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Google DoubleClick | Google provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Index Exchange | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Sovrn | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Ads | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Unified Ad Marketplace | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
AppNexus | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Openx | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Rubicon Project | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
TripleLift | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Say Media | We partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy) |
Remarketing Pixels | We may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites. |
Conversion Tracking Pixels | We may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service. |
Statistics | |
---|---|
Author Google Analytics | This is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy) |
Comscore | ComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Tracking Pixel | Some articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy) |
Clicksco | This is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy) |