Category filtering for French, German, and Spanish ads

We recently expanded category filtering to publishers in additional English-speaking countries, and we're happy to announce that the feature is now available for ads in French, German, and Spanish. With category filtering, you can prevent ads from up to 8 specific categories from appearing on your pages. Ads in these categories will be filtered if they're in any of the four supported languages, regardless of how they've been targeted to your pages. 

To set up category filtering, sign in to your AdSense account and visit your Ad Review Center, located under the 'AdSense Setup' tab. Once you click 'change', you'll be able to view the full list of categories you can filter. In addition, we'll show you the percentage of revenue and ad impressions you've been receiving from each category in the last 30 days, which can help you understand the impact that applying filters might have.

For more information about category filtering, feel free to visit our Help Center. We're still working towards making this feature available in more languages, and we'll be sure to let you know about any updates.

Posted by Arlene Lee - Inside AdSense Team

Wednesday, December 02, 2009 at 10:53:00 AM

The AdSense Product Ideas page: Now accepting your submissions and votes

This past year, we've been working on building features based on your feedback, and we'd like to offer you the opportunity to tell us what's on your AdSense wishlist for 2010. What features or product updates would you like to see? Whether it's an idea for a brand new feature or just a small tweak that would simplify your workflow, we'd like to hear it. 

With that in mind, we've created a Product Ideas page just for AdSense, and invite you to sign in with your Google Account and submit your suggestions during the next two weeks. You can also look through all submitted ideas and vote on the ones you like.

While we aren't able to guarantee that all the ideas on this page will be implemented, we can guarantee that we'll take the top ideas (as voted by you), and bring them to the AdSense Product Management team for review. By submitting an idea, you agree that Google may use the idea to develop and enhance Google's products and services.

This Ideas page will be open until December 15th, so be sure to add your ideas and vote soon!

Posted by Arlene Lee - Inside AdSense Team

Tuesday, December 01, 2009 at 11:54:00 AM

Update your tax forms this holiday weekend

We hope you had a great Thanksgiving. Here in the U.S., we on the AdSense Team are spending the Friday after Thanksgiving enjoying holiday shopping, American football, and leftovers.

On this vacation day, we'd like you to remind you that tax season is approaching quickly, so you may wish to take a moment to review your address information and even re-submit your tax information to make sure it reflects your most current tax standing.

If you haven't entered tax information before, you can choose a form directly or follow our handy tax wizard within your account. If you're updating your tax information, feel free to click the 'change your tax information' link.

In addition, now would be the perfect time for our publishers in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico to verify their bank accounts for Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) payments. If you're eligible for a payment at the end of December, you have until December 15, 2009 to select your bank account for payment, so we hope you give it a try!

Posted by Elizabeth Ferdon - AdSense Payments Team

Friday, November 27, 2009 at 8:04:00 AM

Happy Thanksgiving

We'd like to wish all our U.S. publishers a very Happy Thanksgiving. As always, we'd like to give thanks to our Inside AdSense readers for your participation and support. If you're traveling, we hope your journey is safe, and wish you a fun holiday weekend with your family and friends.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Posted by Dia Muthana - Inside AdSense Team

Thursday, November 26, 2009 at 11:20:00 AM

A deeper look at channels: Custom channels (Part II of III)

In the second part of our channels series, we'll focus on custom channels. Boyar Naito will walk you through how to set up custom channels to track the performance of specific ad units. You'll learn about the three pieces of information that are most important to us: ad size, ad location, and page content, and how to analyze this information to figure out what ad formats work best for your website.



You can find more information about custom channels in our Help Center. Catch the last part of this series next week, when we'll cover targetable channels.

Posted by Dia Muthana - Inside AdSenseTeam

Monday, November 23, 2009 at 2:42:00 PM

A deeper look at channels: URL channels (Part I of III)

As many of you know, channels are a great tool for tracking the clicks and impressions on your ad units, as well as figuring out which ad placements, sizes, and colors generate the most revenue. With that in mind, three of our very own Mountain View-based AdSense optimization specialists have created videos showcasing best practices for setting up channels within your AdSense account.

In the first episode, Matthew Carpenter-Arevalo talks about URL channels which can help you track revenue on a specific URL or domain. You'll learn how to set up a channel within your AdSense account, what metrics you can track using channels, and how to use that data to increase your earnings by generating more clicks on your ads.



You can find more information about URL channels in our Help Center. Check back next week, when we'll cover custom channels.

Posted by Dia Muthana - Inside AdSense team

Wednesday, November 18, 2009 at 3:38:00 PM

Google Ad Planner Publisher Center: Take advantage of new ways to reach advertisers

Earlier this year, we introduced the Google Ad Planner Publisher Center to help you showcase your site to advertisers. Now we've enhanced the Publisher Center to give you even more ways to promote and manage your Ad Planner site profile. As a reminder, any publisher can use the Publisher Center, but the user interface is currently only available in English.

Claim your subdomains
You can now claim subdomains, such as myblog.blogspot.com, in Google Ad Planner. Your site's subdomains can also appear in Google Ad Planner to give advertisers a more detailed view of your site for their media planning. Learn how to claim your sites in Google Ad Planner.

Share more Google Analytics metrics
We've expanded the type of Google Analytics data you can share with Google Ad Planner. You can opt-in your page views, unique visitors (cookies), total visits, average visits per visitor, and average time on site, which ensures potential advertisers see the most accurate information for your site. Learn how to share your Google Analytics data.

Delegate site ownership
Managing your website profile in Ad Planner has just gotten easier. You can now invite additional users to edit and maintain your Google Ad Planner site profile.

Display an Ad Planner badge
Highlight your Google Ad Planner profile by displaying our new badge on your site. Advertisers who click your badge will be brought directly to your Google Ad Planner site profile, where they'll find your traffic, demographics, and advertising information.

Choose from four Ad Planner badges:



Tell us what you think
We invite you to sign in to Google Ad Planner now to try these new features, then send us your feedback and ideas so we can continue improving Google Ad Planner for you. In addition, don't forget to register for our upcoming Ad Planner webinar on November 24th, where you'll learn more about how to use the tool and how it can benefit your site.

Posted by Wayne Lin - Product Manger, Google Ad Planner

Tuesday, November 17, 2009 at 11:14:00 AM

Site maintenance on Saturday, November 14

This Saturday, our engineers will be performing routine site maintenance from 10am to 2pm PST. You'll be unable to log in to your AdSense and Ad Manager accounts during this time, but we'll continue serving ads to your pages and tracking your clicks, impressions, and earnings as usual. In addition, your ad targeting won't be affected.

We've converted the maintenance start time for a few cities around the world:

Toronto - 1pm Saturday
Buenos Aires - 3pm Saturday
Cape Town - 8pm Saturday
Moscow - 9pm Saturday
New Delhi -11:30pm Saturday
Melbourne - 5am Sunday

If you'd like to learn more about what goes on during these maintenance periods, check out this Inside AdSense post.

Posted by Dia Muthana - Inside AdSense Team

Thursday, November 12, 2009 at 1:47:00 PM

Western Union launched in new countries

We're excited to announce the launch of Western Union payments in the following new countries:

Puerto Rico
Jamaica
Virgin Islands (British)
Ecuador
Costa Rica
Paraguay

Western Union Quick Cash payments will reach you much faster than checks, and they're free of charge. A couple things to note: we can only send Western Union payments to publishers that have an Individual account at this time, and the payee name on your account must exactly match the government issued ID card that you'll use while picking up your payments.

For more information on how to sign up to receive Western Union payments, and instructions on how to pick up your payments please visit our Help Center.

Posted by Deborah Chang - AdSense Payments Team

Wednesday, November 11, 2009 at 10:05:00 AM

Upcoming webinars from the AdSense team

Following up on our recent webinar geared towards education sites, we're starting to roll out more webinars geared towards specific types of sites. Webinars are free web seminars where one of our AdSense team members will deliver a presentation on a certain topic, after which you can ask the specialists questions about AdSense on your site. Below, we've listed the other verticals we're going to discuss in upcoming weeks, so be sure to sign up!

• Why AdSense is right for Retail
  November 11th, 9am PST/5pm GMT
  
  
• Maximize your AdSense revenue on your Home and Garden site
  November 18th, 9.00am PST/5pm GMT
  
  
• Make the most of your forum with AdSense
  November 19th, 5pm GMT/9am PST
  
  
• Optimizing AdSense on your Business and Finance site
  November 25th, 9.00am PST

You may also be interested in checking out the main webinar page in our Help Center for information on other products we'll be talking about such as AdSense for Search, Google Ad Manager, and Google Analytics.

If you have any feedback for us on any of these webinars, or topics that you'd like to see covered in future webinars, please leave us a comment.

Posted by Siobhan McCormack - AdSense Optimisation Team

Tuesday, November 10, 2009 at 4:00:00 PM