Placing Images Next to AdSense Ads Can Get You Banned

Placing Images near Adsense ad was a sure shot way to increase click throughs, but there was bit of confusion surrounding this. Some publishers said placing a visible line separating ads and image should be OK, others said placing images could get you banned.

Google has posted a policy clarification regarding images on their blog. Here’s an excerpt:

Can I place small images next to my Google ads?
We ask that publishers not line up images and ads in a way that suggests a relationship between the images and the ads. If your visitors believe that the images and the ads are directly associated, or that the advertiser is offering the exact item found in the neighboring image, they may click the ad expecting to find something that isn’t actually being offered. That’s not a good experience for users or advertisers.
Publishers should also be careful to avoid similar implementations that people could find misleading. For instance, if your site contains a directory of Flash games, you should not format the ads to mimic the game descriptions.

What if I place a space or a line between my images and my ads? Would that work?
No. If the ads and the images appear to be associated, inserting a small space or a line between the images and ads will not make the implementation compliant.

Does this mean I can’t place ads on pages with images?
You can definitely place Google ads on pages containing images — just make sure that the ads and images are not arranged in a way that could easily mislead or confuse your visitors. For example, if you run a stock photography site with a catalog of thumbnail images, don’t line the ads up with the thumbnails in a way that could be misleading. Consider using a full border around your ads or changing your ad colors.

Even if Google allowed me to place images near ads, I wouldn’t do so because its matter blogging ethics. Being an Adwords user myself, I know the pains of advertisers. Google is doing this to protect the interest of both advertisers and publishers.

This post was published by on December 19, 2006

About the Author: Thilak Rao works as a Social Media Expert. He is one of the first professional bloggers from India, and he loves to write, travel and click photos. Follow him on Twitter @thilak

  • http://www.rishiraj.info Rishi

    Now thats gonna hurt the good wordpress plugin ADSENSE DECORATOR!

  • http://www.freakitude.com Lovedeep Wadhwa

    It will hit adsense CTR more..

  • http://tech-buzz.net Thilak

    Rishi: Haha… Yeah, This announcement comes as a kicker to Adsense decorator plugin :D

    Lovedeep: Obviously !!

  • Linu

    This is going to hurt Joel comm’s Adsense webtemplates Bussiness.

    I think the ONLY excuse google can give to is photo gallery sites, as google ads comes on around photo thumpnails or such pages!

  • http://www.davidairey.com/blog David Airey

    Interesting. Thanks for the post.

    I had tried running the Adsense Beautifier plugin a while back but in the end couldn’t get it to work. Anyway, now I don’t bother with advertising on my site, preferring pure content.

    All the best.

  • http://www.WiseTome.com/Splat Vyoma

    This is definetly good for the Adwords user, and since I never attempted doing the trick – because it looked cheap – I cannot comemnt if the CTR would affect or not.

    But there is one more thing that Publishers need to be careful about now. Even when placing images in articles (like in blog posts), where the images is related to blog post care needs to be taken so that the image is in no way aligned to any other Adsense blocks on the page.

    It may not seem as much, but considering the case where a blog theme or something changes, and the images move around with in the blog post because of this, then it would be a nightmare to go through all the posts (if you have a large post count) and see to it that all of them conform to the policy to the word.

  • http://adsense4dummies.blogspot.com AdSense Tips

    I can kind of understand why AdSense are doing this. People are naturally drawn to image on the page, so are more likely to associate an image with the text (or ad unit) adjacent to to it. On the otherhand you might argue Google just want to inflict more petty rules on webmasters and have an even greater influence on page layout.

  • http://www.yourevaluate.info YOUREVALUATE

    Therefore, they are long–term debts

  • http://www.lases.org Yigit T.

    I inserted my adsense code between 2 pictures, my ratio became good BUT after 2 weeks Google banned my account

  • http://loan.sipenglipurlara.com Safuan

    Good Tips From You