The Google Advertising Professional program is intended to boost AdWords spending. Essentially, it's a VAR program, with the GAPs being media buyers who are reselling AdWords to their clients.

Your proposed GASP program would be far different: It would add a layer of middlemen to the relationship between Google and publishers, diluting Google's control over the Google-publisher relationship and giving the middlemen leverage that (at least in theory) could be used to dictate terms to Google later on. Why would Google want to encourage that?

Most of what you want is available from using Google AdSense API. There is only a small hitch. You need to have over 100K daily impressions to be eligible for it.

Ok thanks for replies.

It would add a layer of middlemen to the relationship between Google and publishers, diluting Google's control over the Google-publisher relationship and giving the middlemen leverage that (at least in theory) could be used to dictate terms to Google later on.

signor_john: I agree with you on this. Yes this is possible but then if you look at other way Google may always wanted to have better and good quality Publishers and websites in this program.
There are many quality websites I know which are not in this program and Google would definately like to have them. Getting these websites into Adsense can be done by GASPs.
What I can understand from your replies is that Google may not want to offer commission to GASPs. That is fair.
But they could get a big benefit from these GASPs about educating Publishers and giving support to publishers.
This could reduce significant burden on their already overburdened support department.

Most of what you want is available from using Google AdSense API. There is only a small hitch. You need to have over 100K daily impressions to be eligible for it.

acac : Thats the whole point here. The things you know may not be known to a small publisher and there may be many things like this which a veteran Adsense publisher knows but not many newbies.

Rajiv

Top 10 Questions for Google AdSense Professionals:

1. Are the stats stuck today?

2. Are earnings down today?

3. Is the economy causing my AdSense income to shrink?

4. Is Google keeping more of my money?

5. Is smart-pricing real?

6. Is it better to have lots of ads on a page or just a few ads?

7. How can I make a lot of money fast with AdSense?

8. Why was my site banned by AdSense?

9. Someone filed a DMCA complaint against me. I can't believe I got caught. What do I do now?

10. How can I find a list of the top paying keywords?

- FarmBoy

Farmboy : Very good and relevant question. I doubt GASP can answer all the questions. But surely it could be a good start for a better communication with google. Atleast may be he can put forward some of the questions from Publisher to Adsense Support.
Questions 1-5 I dont think even ASA will answer let alone GASP. But 6,7,8,9,10 I really think GASP can definately help with his knowledge.

Relatively easy to answer the 10 questions. Just send them to WW ! Or send them the specific Links to the relevant posts on WW ( If they are still confused..)

Seriously, adSense is a black box. And an adSense Professional can add little value ( except to make guesses) or recycle adSense F.A.Q..

Ok, I must say here that it is relatively easy to post these questions in ww and get the answers. But will these answers will be specific to your website? Or they will be general. As we all know most of the forums do not allow us to post the URLs. Also most of the members here dont give answers tailormade to the website in question.
Like a very popular question "why my website was banned,I did nothing wrong." Members do answer to these questions but will it not be ideal if we can put this question to an expert certified by google?

Relatively easy to answer the 10 questions

It certainly is.

1. Are the stats stuck today?
A. Possibly. Depending on your global location any number of things could be happening to your stats. Quit checking them every hour and you'll be less likely to freak out like this.

2. Are earnings down today?
A. For some they are. For some they're not. What goes up must come down. Are you familiar with Yin and Yang?

3. Is the economy causing my AdSense income to shrink?
A. Very possibly. This could also depend on your niche. If your website offers reviews of home siding for instance, or installation of in-ground swimming pools, you may see a marked downturn in CTR. If, however, your website offers detailed information on how to grow your own backyard garden, cultivate tobacco on your patio, installation of solar panels on rooftops, etc... you may see a considerable increase.

4. Is Google keeping more of my money?
A. Of course not. Why would they do that?

5. Is smart-pricing real?
A. Oh yes. Yes indeed.

6. Is it better to have lots of ads on a page or just a few ads?
A. Some report yes. Some report no. Without a thorough publisher survey this question can't be answered. I know of an official adsense rep who advised an individual to plaster ads all over the page without thought of the consequences to the page layout, destruction of color scheme, impaired visitor interaction, etc... In fact this adsense rep grabbed source code off this persons site, inserted adsense code wherever he thought appropriate, then took screen grabs and emailed them to this person in order to illustrate exact placement of where he thought the ads should go. At this point this person decided to never communicate with adsense support again. And he hasn't.

7. How can I make a lot of money fast with AdSense?
A. Scrape existing sites. Use arbitrage in a somewhat more clever and less conspicuous manner than has been done in the past. Hack existing sites and insert your own adsense code into them. Encourage friends, neighbors, forum members and your own little chat buddies to click your ads. Buy cool "ready made adsense sites" off ebay for a song. Consult witch doctors. Cross your fingers and pray.

8. Why was my site banned by AdSense?
A. sighs...

9. Someone filed a DMCA complaint against me. I can't believe I got caught. What do I do now?
A. Get a real job. Apologize to the complaint filer and hope for the best. Bribe the complaint filer and hope for the best. Claim ignorance and hope it works. Get a lawyer and hope your pockets are deeper than theirs.

10. How can I find a list of the top paying keywords?
A. Sticky me.

edit: fixed fat finger typos...

[edited by: wyweb at 5:43 am (utc) on July 10, 2009]

Like a very popular question "why my website was banned,I did nothing wrong."

Because most banned publishers DO know what they did wrong and are just looking for ways to get back in.

Farmboy : Very good and relevant question.

I think you need to fix your sarcasm detector.

winks at koan...

Koan: Ok may be you are right. I did not notice the sarcasm in farmboy's post.

Because most banned publishers DO know what they did wrong and are just looking for ways to get back in

Agreed,but always it may not be the same case. For example Google can stop showing ads on a site of a publisher who has not put up say "Privacy Policy Page" at all, (Let alone update Privacy Policy). Again these things look very simple to a seasoned publisher but not so for many. Also if you read my Original post I have mentioned that the GASP will recommend the site to google through his Control Panel and he will be responsible for that site to a certain extent. So either he could advice to Publisher what he has done wrong may be.
See guys I want you people to think from the point of view of general businesses. Lets keep aside scammers and spammers for time being. I know its a big part of Adsense but there is also a big part of serious publishers.

Rajiv

You're fighting a losing battle here, Rajiv.

Well actually, simple and basic problems and issues with adSense, show a lack of respect by the publisher towards the adSense program. If a publisher has NOT read the adSense TOS and Policies, he/she does not really deserve to be in the program and G will most probably ban him when he reaches USD 100 and keep that money ;-) Why should G be interested in catering to non serious players and especially when such players put the axe on their own foot and enable G to make some side cash..

rajivatre;

Probably not a bad idea at it's root.

Many honest publishers really do try to make AdSense work for them, but just don't understand how to maximize their income without turning their websites into not MFA clones. That's obvious by a lot of the questions we see in this forum.

A consultant might be able to do well at this.

ken_b: thanks for understanding my point. I really think this is necessity just like you have other consultants in offline world.

netmag: I dont really think this is battle or fight because here I am not fighting with anyone just trying to explain my point and trying to understand the thoughts of others.

green_grass: In my opinion Google is very much interested in having the quality advertisers as well as quality publishers. Thats why they introduce Google Adwords Professional program to improve the quality of Google Adwords. I myself have passed this examination for my ex-comapny and studied very hard for it. So I know how much efforts google has put into preparing curriculum for this Exam.

Ofcourse I have not posted this topic because I am adwords professional and want to become Adsense Professional now. But it might in general help to improve the quality of the websites in Adsense.
Rajiv

Well you can call yourself an AdSense Professional if you want (in my mind, there's only one, and her name is jensense) But it's highly unlikely that there will be any Google-sanctioned certification, such as there is for AdWords. As explained above, there's no strong reason for Google to do such a thing.

netmag: ok dont get me wrong. I never said I am adsense professional I only said that I am adwords certified professional. Again I am not claiming my knowledge of adsense is as much as many of you here. I highly respect the crowd here and thats why this post in this forum. I am also a big fan of Jensense and I quite regularly read her blogs. I am also big fan of you, netmeg and I regularly read your posts in this forum. (no flattering here)
I respect your opinion that google may not have strong reason to do such thing.
I will appreciate opinions of more people on this.

Well you said all the right things rajivatre. As has been said, Google has no incentive to create the position you're suggesting, while they have an extreme monetary incentive to create, maintain and foster this position on the adwords side.

I'm not sure what else to say.... Good luck I guess.

Furthermore... anyone proclaiming to be an "Adsense Professional" would be highly suspect in my book. Even with Goog's blessing. Perhaps especially so.

Highly.

Allow me to introduce myself, FarmBoy, AP (AdSense Professional).

If you have any questions about AdSense, just let me know.

FarmBoy, AP

Remember Google does already offer it's own version of this type of consulting, its "optimization team" or whatever they call it now. Of course that's a relatively limited program, but it does show G has some interest in the AdSense consulting concept.

Google should have every bit as much interest in making sure legitimate publishers do as well as possible as they have in getting advertisers to use the content network.

After all, both publishers and Google are getting paid by the click or impression.

Over the years we've seen any number of publishers post here who have good content on nice sites that have gotten frustrated with trying make AdSense work for them.

If better placement of ads or better choices of colors and ad formats and/or ad types can increase legitimate earnings for publishers then Google stands to benefit a lot.

If a consultant, approved by G or not, can help publishers do that, more power to them, it makes the whole system better for all of us. It seems to me that the better honest publishers do with AdSense the more likely honest advertisers will be to use the content network.

Should those consultants be "approved by" or carry an official Google label, that's debatable.

Maybe an independent consultant that could and would actually work for the benefit of the publisher might be the best way to go.

The world can probably use more than one.

Google should have every bit as much interest in making sure legitimate publishers do as well as possible as they have in getting advertisers to use the content network.

FWIW, on the AdWords side of things, I think that Google has created, over time, the need for AdWords Professionals, by making that side of things so complex.

FarmBoy, AP

its "optimization team"

Ken,

Have they ever given you exciting tips or anything?

All I ever got was vague and generic "one size suits all" tips which can already be seen on the AdSense site.

They came to me, not the other way around. Years ago.

Farmboy: Hello Farmboy, I will not miss this time. :) Give me tips to make millions from Adsense. he he.
Ken: Yes that exactly my point of view. In my opinion google gets lots of money through content network and I really feel they are very serious on content network because of the money involved in it. Well I dont know what tips Premium Publishers get from Google but then they can offer somewhat similar knowledge to the GASP.
Thanks very much for your opinions guys. Thats why I really love this forum.

Rajiv

Well I dont know what tips Premium Publishers get from Google but then they can offer somewhat similar knowledge to the GASP.

Trouble is, the tips that, in theory, could be most effective--"Get rid of your site about French medieval poetry, become an expert on a topic that attracts people who are researching purchases, and write great pages about that"--aren't likely to be practical or accepted by the publishers who hear them.

Tips. I got tips. I'm a minnow in the adsense food chain, okay? I'm not even big. Nowhere near. But I got tips.... oh boy did I get some tips.

I was contacted by adsense support. The individual had grabbed code off one of my better pages and taken the liberty of adding a leaderboard at top, a leaderboard at bottom and 120x600 skyscrapers or whatever the hell they're called on both right and left sides. It looked like a whorehouse.

We're gonna help you optimize your page, he said. It was unsolicited. Out of the blue. Completely un-f... wanted.

This was what? 4, 5 years ago? It was a while back anyway.. whenever...

I wrote him back and said you must be mad. What kinda stuff you guys smoking there at the plex and how much does it cost?

I'll quit before I whore my sites out like that and this is exactly what I told him.

I have had no communication with adsense support since.

In fact I'm just about finished with them period.

I fully agree with wyweb that putting lots of ads on the page rarely helps in improving adsense performance. But that would be a different topic altogether.
I sincerely believe that there are many publishers out their who may be more knowledgeable about what work in Adsense system and what not than many people in plex. Because these guys are working out very hard practically to earn the money. So their experience really counts.
Here I will again put up my point about GASP. For ex. Say Signor_john or wyweb are very experienced publisher and I want their help (Paid) in improving my site for adsense. How do I know whether they are really qualified to do this job? Here's where the GASP certification could come into the picture and could be helpful for me to decide that these guys are really qualified.
Now whether google would be interested in having the one is for ASA to answer :)

Rajiv

This was what? 4, 5 years ago? It was a while back anyway.. whenever...

I wrote him back and said you must be mad. What kinda stuff you guys smoking there at the plex and how much does it cost?

I'll quit before I whore my sites out like that and this is exactly what I told him.

I have had no communication with adsense support since

Exactly my own experience, similar time frame.