What is the best color for the link/big text ad "arrow"?

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What is the best color for the link/big text ad "arrow"?

Wondering what works.

littlecubpanda

12:48 am on Dec 11, 2013 (gmt 0)

If you set the link color to "black" it will also turn the big Adsense text ad arrow black.

Or blue. Or any color. The arrow is very prominent and a fixture of the text ads.

I had heard BLACK is the best "color" to use, so I've done that, but I've noticed since doing my CTR continues to decline on my main site. Not sure if the issue is related.

The most common color, of course, is BLUE, because that is the default. I personally don't really like it. GREEN is also common.

I'm wondering what the consensus is on this?

I think BLACK looks the most professional/clean, but I'm not sure it works as well -- because it's not as apparent that the ad represents a LINK.

* Note: I just switched back to the Google default on all my text ads. I'll update if there is any change.

matbennett

9:18 am on Dec 12, 2013 (gmt 0)

A really important AdSense concept to grasp is that there is not secret recipe that works for all sites. The best colour for my home page might not be the best for yours... or even for another page on my site.

We all have our own colour schemes, our own layout, our own niche (where expectations differ), our own content and our own audience. These things all impact how different ads perform.

Test ideas and measure the impact. That is the best way to continually be working to drive up results.

With regards to colours that is now really easy. You can just run an experiement and Google will tell you which works best on your site. [support.google.com...]

lucy24

9:37 am on Dec 12, 2013 (gmt 0)

I had heard BLACK is the best "color" to use

Where the bleep did you hear that?! Some folks will even foam at the mouth if you go to {text-decoration: none;} (retaining the browser's default colors). Besides, you don't mean black. You mean {color: inherit;}. Might not happen to be black; it depends on the page.*

* But if it's #777 or lighter, someone needs to be taken out and shot.

netmeg

1:45 pm on Dec 12, 2013 (gmt 0)

Test test and test, and keep testing, because it can change. For years and years every test I did showed that red links way out performed everything else on my sites, and now suddenly blue (not the standard blue but a darker #009 blue) has better than twice the CTR of the other combinations (red, green, a few others)

littlecubpanda

1:53 pm on Dec 12, 2013 (gmt 0)

Fascinating.

I'm trying this experiment on all my sites:

Google default (blue, green link, black text)

VS.

0000FF Blue, 0000FF Blue link(arrow), black text and ROBOTO LIGHT (my favorite font).

So we'll see how it goes.

@ Netmeg,

That's interesting... I may try a darker blue in the future, like Midnight blue #191970 or Navy #000080 or Darkblue #00008B.

lucy24

9:39 pm on Dec 12, 2013 (gmt 0)

ROBOTO LIGHT (my favorite font)

Cursory research suggests it's a third-party font, meaning that unless you're embedding (huge increase in download size, not 100% supported) or google offers it as an image, you're wasting your time.

afaik, all current browsers support the short form #00F.

icedowl

10:44 pm on Dec 12, 2013 (gmt 0)

lucy24, roboto light is one of the choices in the adsense account settings.

lucy24

11:46 pm on Dec 12, 2013 (gmt 0)

Yeah, I figured, since it's google's font. But how does that work, physically? Does the person viewing the ad have to download an embedded font, or is it displayed as an image?

netmeg

1:11 am on Dec 13, 2013 (gmt 0)

All the alternate fonts are Google fonts; they're definitely not images. The code is probably hooked into Google fonts in some way.

littlecubpanda

2:09 am on Dec 13, 2013 (gmt 0)

There's no way Google would let a font be used that couldn't be displayed on every, single device -- if the user does not have that font, they I assume a default font is shown in its place.

matrix_jan

7:13 am on Dec 13, 2013 (gmt 0)

Well, since you guys are a bit off of the topic, I'm experimenting a new layout with roboto font for the page and a custom adsense unit with verdana font. BUT, that verdana turns into a roboto when I view the page. Whether it be a tablet, smartphone or a regular computer text ads always show in roboto. And about loading time - It's 2013 on the net too, roboto loads in 10 milliseconds.

And about colors, there is no absolute color that would work for everyone. Adsense has made A/B testing easy, so I suggest you try that and see what color works better for you.

breeks

4:03 pm on Dec 13, 2013 (gmt 0)

If you set the link color to "black" it will also turn the big Adsense text ad arrow black.

I have my link color set to blue and up until last week the big arrow was blue. Since then its changed to black. So I have blue links and black arrow.

I much preferred the blue arrow (fits site template) but have black arrows.

Advertiser url is set to black perhaps this is making arrow black.

CTR seems about the same for both blue arrow and black arrow.

breeks

4:36 pm on Dec 13, 2013 (gmt 0)

Update:

Switched the advertiser URL to blue and the arrow is now blue. Now I'm not sure if I like blue or black :)

lucy24

1:38 am on Dec 14, 2013 (gmt 0)

... is one of the choices in the adsense account settings

... and one of the perils of operating in "recent posts" mode is that sometimes you blunder into forums where you really don't belong :( But as long as I'm here: do "black" and "blue" mean exactly that, i.e. #000 and #00F respectively-- or do they mean "inherit" (use the same color as other text in the same element) vs. {nothing} (use the browser's default link colors, typically blue and purple unless otherwise specified)?

littlecubpanda

5:02 am on Jan 5, 2014 (gmt 0)

Black and blue mean black and blue, the main HTML colors.

I've changed just about everything over to Black text, Black link/arrow, BLUE TITLE, and Lora font.