I use the Text and Image option. That way you can get the highest paying adds available at any given moment.

That way you can get the highest paying adds available at any given moment

What makes you say that?

I use text ads only, but that's because I have a rep firm selling display ads and I don't want more than one display ad per page. Otherwise, I'd let Google offer both.

Personally I have found that people are less inclined to click on an image ad, so although Adsense say that the image ads pay better, you have to weigh up the fact that most people don't click on them. For me, text ads work best.

RhinoFish posted this in the AdWords forum:

"best CTR comes from Graphic Ads"

It suprised me, but this is also true for the content ads I run.

On average, my image ads are roughly 2x-3x above the text ads in CTR and conversion % is about the same.

The thread, titled "Content network usual CTR," is at:

[webmasterworld.com...]

i do 'em both, but your page design could be a factor... having a google image ad compete with a bunch of other graphics on a page could result in lower ctr, while text might stand out better in that environment.

Text and image.

[...I use the Text and Image option. That way you can get the highest paying adds available at any given moment....]

But how about the ECPM and overall income?

I have suspected that many images ads have not worked well for me, so I have limited my ads to text only.

correct me if i am wrong but i don't believe you get paid for people clicking on image ads, they are paid per 1000s of impressions.

despite what google says about only displaying them when they pay more than contextual ads for that page given the nature of clicks for that page etc, i think that is bul*sh*t, they can't even get their algorhythms right for suitable contextual advertising, search engine positions or smart pricing so i don't see how they can individually analise every page of every webmaster's account and work it out.

after many experiments over many months, i know that for me, image ads suck and always result in a dip in earnings compared to the text only option.

correct me if i am wrong but i don't believe you get paid for people clicking on image ads, they are paid per 1000s of impressions.

You're wrong. Image ads can be either CPC or CPM ads. The same goes for text ads.

efv, they have higher CTR for the AdWords advertiser but that doesn't mean it will work out as well for us publishers. If a graphic ad taking up the wide leaderboard space gets clicked on twice as often as each of the four text ads that would have been in that space otherwise, it would result in CTR halving for the publisher with what would seem to be the better performing image ad.

I did my part and tried to give image ads a shot when they were first introduced and went back to "text ads only" rather quickly. It's my impression that because few advertisers bother to create graphic ads that the bidding on graphic ads is not as competitive.

If I'm wrong and things have changed (ummm, if some of you are having better success with running both type of ads) then I have no problem kicking the tires again.

Paris, I was responding to the statement that "so although Adsense say that the image ads pay better, you have to weigh up the fact that most people don't click on them." The AdWords thread that I linked to said otherwise.

For some publishers, image ads will increase earnings; for others, they may decrease earnings. The only way to make an educated guess is to test--and even then, it's probably a crapshoot, because there are so many other variables that can influence the results.

In my opinion, it call comes down to what you think will work best for you. For me, the decision was easy: I already have display ads from another source, so I turned Google's image ads off to minimize visual clutter and protect my existing display advertisers. But if I didn't have display ads from another source, I'd probably leave Google image ads turned on just because Google is in a better position than I am to determine what's likely to yield the most revenue from the "Ads by Google" box.

Text Ads Only

Are you guys aware that Google is running a combo ad that has both an image and text ads running in the same adblock?

I have a screen grab of an ad that was running on my site that is a regular 160x600 virticle ad that had a "Gold Egg" in the top section of the ad. The "Gold Egg" took the place of the top text ad, the rest of the ad block was regular text ads.

Mike

Interesting. I haven't run across that.

I have a screen grab of an ad that was running on my site that is a regular 160x600 virticle ad that had a "Gold Egg" in the top section of the ad

The golden egg is probably not an ad. Google has been putting an image in some of its ads, presumably to combat ad blindness. I believe they are experimenting with it, so you won't see it a whole lot.

If you think about how image ads work on the adwords side, it's pretty unlikely that the egg is an ad.

it's pretty unlikely that the egg is an ad.
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I never wrote that it was an "Image Ad" I only wrote that it was an "image". I agree that it was probably not an "Image Ad". I think it was there just to attract attention to the ad, which is against the TOS by the way.

":^) ®

Mike

which is against the TOS by the way

That's funny!

Against the tos for WHO? (or is that whom).

Maybe you can help out. Can you direct me to the specific part of the TOS that says that "google may not direct attention to the ads"?