How To Increase Your Blog's Earning Potential with Google AdSense

When you include Google AdSense ads on your blog, there is certainly potential to make money, but how? Many beginner bloggers have Google AdSense ads running, but the earnings aren't coming. Follow the steps below to give your blog's Google AdSense program the greatest chance for success and start making money now.

Time Required: Ongoing

Here's How:

1: Determine your blog's primary focus.

Google AdSense ads are most effective when they are served to people who are interested in the products and services those ads offer. With that in mind, Google AdSense tends to work best on blogs that are about niche topics such as a specific product or hobby. Consider how you can make your blog's topic more focused to better attract specific types of readers and specific types of ads.

2.Write consistent and focused content.

Google serves ads based on the content on each of your pages. The more focused your content is on each page, the better Google can determine which ads are the most relevant to your readers. Write consistently and stay focused on a specific topic to increase the likelihood that Google will display ads on your blog that your readers are apt to click on.

3.Work to increase your blog's traffic.

The more visitors to your blog, the more potential for clicks on your Google AdSense ads. Work to increase your blog's traffic to boost your chances for ad click-throughs. However, keep in mind that if you write focused content, the ads on your blog will be relevant to that content. The traffic that comes to your blog needs to be interested in your blog's topic and your content, or they are not likely to be interested in your corresponding Google AdSense ads. Work to drive traffic but make a concerted effort to find traffic that adds value to your blog.

4.Research and test keywords.

Google serves ads through its AdSense program based on keywords. Advertisers bid on keywords relevant to their businesses. Some keywords are more popular than others and therefore, drive higher bids. Higher paying keywords also mean higher payouts to you when your readers click on them. The ads served on your site are determined by the content on your site. If you're writing about topics related to higher paying keywords, then you're likely to earn more money from your Google AdSense program than if you wrote about topics related to lower paying keywords.

5.Test Google AdSense ad positions on your blog.

You can display Google AdSense ads just about anywhere on your blog. Test a variety of positions on your blog to determine which work best for you in terms of generating click-throughs and maximum revenue.

Tips:

1.Check with your blogging software provider and blog host to ensure your blogging package allows you to place Google AdSense ads on your blog. For example,Wordpress.com does not allow Google AdSense ads.

2.Don't fall victim to the allure of covering your blog in ads to generate income. Blogs that are cluttered with ads are difficult to read, and readers typically don't return to blogs where the meaningful content is hidden in between ads.

3.Track your results to see what's working, particularly as you test keywords and ad positions. This will allow you to develop the best advertising mix to maximize your blog's income while staying consistent to your blog's brand image and overall message to readers at the same time.

How to Achieve Site Goals Through Design

Every site has a reason for being online. It has a purpose. Good design takes into account that purpose, and then works towards it.

Site goals are what you want your visitors to do on your site. It is important to make the distinction between what you want, and whatthey want (Although the two may often overlap).

For instance, your readers may not originally want to sign up to your newsletter, but if you want it enough, you just might persuade them.

The first stage in creating a great design is to lay out your blog’s goals. My advice is to scribble down everything that you would like to gain from your site (RSS readers, advert clicks, sales leads etc.), then take that list and order it by importance. It is important to think this through now because it will make decision making during the actual design much, much easier.

It’s All About Prominence

Readers will not read everything on your page. The path to achieving your goals rests on choosing what you really want visitors to see, and knowing what you won’t mind them not seeing. In short, it is about giving prominence to the important elements.

The tricky thing about prominence is knowing not to overdo it. There are many ways of giving an element prominence, and they will be discussed below, but it is crucial to realize that in order for one thing to stand out, another has to fade in.

In short, for every element you give prominence to, you lessen the overall effect of those elements. This is the main cause of clutter. When a person attempts to highlight too many sections of the page, the effect is ruined, and instead of one or two things drawing a reader’s attention, everything tries to draw that attention, causing confusion and loss. Minimalism is about drawing attention to just one or two, crucial, elements.

How To Create Prominence

• Positioning. The key locations are the top of the page, above the fold, and in the center. User eye movements will tend to flicker over these locations, so placing important content here will make it more likely to be noticed.
• Color. There are a number of ways of making a certain color pop out of the background it is on. Does it contrast with the background? Is it a more intense, saturated color? Most backgrounds are cold colors (How often do you see blue backgrounds?), so using a warm color will make the element stand out. Various color combination tools can help you out.
• Size. If it’s big, it’s worth noticing, right? Size tends to be a decent indicator of importance. Can you think of a time when a blog’s title was the same size as it’s body copy?
• Inconsistency. Certain styles have consistent traits, like a certain font that is used again and again. If you want to make an element stand out, then break the flow of what the user expects to see(Post headings use a serif font here). Be careful though. Break the flow too often and all you will do is make a mess.
• Active whitespace. Whitespace is simply empty space. Passive whitespace is when we use empty space to pad out a design, and prevent it from feeling claustrophobic. Active whitespace however is when we purposefully space out a certain element, causing it to draw attention.

I bet you read this. Whitespace rocks!

Test your own design out. What is the first thing you notice? Is it really the thing that you want people to notice most? And what caused you to notice it?

7 Elements to Make Your Blog Look Great

n What Makes a Design Good?, I talked about the technical aspects of a good design, like site and user goals, branding, and distinction.

I did not however answer the question of what makes a design look good. What makes one blog visually attractive, but makes another one ugly?

There is no mathematical solution, but there is an artsy one. A good looking design is a combination of a number of factors. If your blog succeeds in each of these areas, then the overall effect will be an appealing design.

Structure

I have a friend who won’t go into a certain sports store because the layout is too confusing. Men’s clothes next to the women’s, kids next to adults, football tops out on their own etc. I’m sure there is an order to it somewhere, but I can’t see it.

There is a lot of information on a web page. You can order your page in your own mind, but if the ordering is not blatantly obvious to a first-time visitor, they’re going to be overloaded and leave.

Structure and grid-based design are the corner-stones of a well laid out blog.

Further Reading: Designing With Grid Based Approach

Balance

A good design is easy to take in. It allows your eye to glide around the page naturally, without being continually drawn to a certain area of the page.

Think of a see-saw. If you put too much weight on one-side, it will tilt in that direction. But if the weights are equal, it will balance.

In the same way, the weights of the different areas of your page should be equal. The weight of a specific element is affected by its size, but also by its color, its position, and even the detail within it.

Further Reading: Principles of Design: Balance

Color

 Image byVygotskij.

Color is a scary topic for many people, but it must be braved. The most sure-fire way to ruin a great design is to choose an awful color scheme.

If you don’t trust your eye to pick a good color scheme, there are many tools out there to help you.

Further Reading: Basic Color Theory

Small Details

A person can appreciate complexity in a design. The small details make the overall effect.

You don’t need great works of art in your header, or fancy features in your sidebar. The small details in your site will communicate the level of effort put into a design all by themselves.

It’s working on those details that takes a design from good to great.

Further Reading: Design Is In The Details

Clarity And Emphasis

No reader cares to read all of the content on your page. Most want to read as little as possible. They only need the gist of your points, and then they move on.

Clarity in your design allows one element to differentiate itself from its neighbor, and emphasis on your most important elements, such as post headlines, indicates clearly where the reader should look.

Ample whitespace is a favorite tactic for achieving this. It lets your design breathe, preventing readers from being overloaded and confused.

Further Reading: Give My Web Space

Remarkability

 Image byOrgutcayli.

This is Seth Godin’s word. You normally hear about it in the context of products and services, but it applies to web design as well.

There are two routes that a design can take. Safe and not safe. You can choose a simple color scheme, a regular 2-column layout and a normal Arial font, and make a decent blog. It won’t be anything spectacular, but it will do the job.

A great design does something more. It goes further than the regular web site and it makes itself unique. Great designs have a certain aspect that makes them better than other sites. Something about them that is worth remarking upon.

Further Reading: 25 Incredibly Artistic Websites

Functionality

Design on the web is not based solely on appearance anymore. Even on blogs, the functionality on your page plays a large role. What do you think when you see beautifully laid out threaded comments? Or well implemented Gravatars?

A good blog is much more than a diary with comments. It allows for you to interact with the content, and makes your experience much more enjoyable.

Further Reading: 35 New WordPress Plugins for an Effective Blogging Experience

When you see a web page with great functionality, obsessive attention to detail and no flaws to be found, it gives you high expectations for the site. It says a lot about the blogger.

There are far more than 7 elements to a great design. These are merely my favorites. What do you think makes a design great?