I never hard any website so far where we wanted to run ads. So this is the first time I’m looking into this topic. To get an overall understanding of the process, we decided to consult ChatGPT.
Question: I have a website and I want to show ads, what should I do?
Answer: If you want to show ads on your website, there are a few steps you can follow:
Define your ad strategy: Determine the types of ads you want to display on your website and the ad formats that will work best for your audience. Consider whether you want to display text ads, image ads, video ads, or a combination of these.
Join an advertising network: Sign up with an advertising network or platform that connects publishers (website owners) with advertisers. Some popular advertising networks include Google AdSense, Media.net, and Amazon Associates. These networks handle the ad serving, payment processing, and targeting options.
Create an account: Create an account with the advertising network of your choice. Provide the required information about your website, such as its URL, content category, and traffic statistics. This information helps advertisers determine whether your website is suitable for their ads.
Get approved: The advertising network will review your website to ensure it complies with their policies and guidelines. Make sure your website has high-quality content, is free from any illegal or prohibited material, and follows the network’s terms of service. Once approved, you will receive an approval notification and gain access to the ad code.
Generate ad code: The advertising network will provide you with ad code snippets or tags that you need to insert into your website’s HTML code. These tags are typically placed in the header, footer, sidebar, or within the content of your web pages. The ad code allows the network to serve ads on your website.
Customize ad placement: Determine where you want the ads to appear on your website. Experiment with different ad placements to find the ones that maximize user engagement and revenue. Common locations include banner ads at the top or bottom of the page, sidebar ads, or within the content itself.
Monitor performance: Keep an eye on your ad performance and make adjustments as needed. Most advertising networks provide analytics and reporting tools that allow you to track impressions, clicks, and revenue. Analyze this data to understand which ads are performing well and optimize your ad placements accordingly.
Comply with policies: Ensure that you comply with the advertising network’s policies, including not clicking on your own ads, preventing invalid activity, and following any specific guidelines they provide. Violating these policies can result in penalties or even the suspension of your account.
Remember to regularly review and update your ad strategy to ensure the best user experience while maximizing your revenue.
In a nutshell
– Select an advertiser
– Register and configure your website
– Add some code snippet to your website
We decided to use Google AdSense as I just assume it will be super easy to use. And in fact, the configuration was seamless.
- Tell Google who you are
- Configure the ads
- Put the code onto your website
To enable Google to place ads on your website, we simply had to add something similar to below to our index.html file:
<script async src="https://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-11111111111111"
crossorigin="anonymous"></script>After the last step, we requested a review. Let’s see how that goes. My guts feeling is that we started this all a bit naively as there seem to be quite some regulations we need to understand and the preview feature was either not working our our page layout doesn’t allow for well placed ads. Maybe we need to add some extra divs / hints for Google to properly place the ads. We will find out after the review process. I think I will be able to blog more about the experience once I see some actual results. Let’s wait!
