There’s an interesting month long [back-to-back test of Yahoo Publisher Network and Adsense->http://www.jensense.com/archives/2005/08/womensfinanceco.html] detailed on JenSense that appears to confirm what other publishers in the YPN beta have been saying:

YPN is paying more per click than Adsense.

Whilst overall earnings from the two networks are fairly equal, with YPN being only slightly more profitable, the reason is YPN’s poorer ad relevancy and lower click-though rates.

Jen writes that the AdSense CTR was initially double that of YPN, but adds that Yahoo’s performance improved over the month.

Whilst the CTR can be expected to continue improving over the coming months, the question is whether the higher EPC will be maintained.

Jen thinks it might not, but with so many variables at play, we’ll probably just have to wait and see how things pan out once the program has been open to the general public for a few months.

In a [separate post->http://www.jensense.com/archives/2005/09/yahoo_publisher_1.html], Jen notes that the new YPN large rectangle ad unit which now shows four ads like Adsense instead of three, may also increase CTR.

From that I assume the YPN ads in her test were showing three ads compared to Adsense’s four. If so, and especially with YPN relevancy being an issue, having that extra ad could well have increased CTR. It might be the only relevant one displayed.

YPN has now also added category targeting. Basically, you can select up to two categories for your entire site, particular directories or individual pages. Publishers can also suggest categories.

Jen has provided a thorough write up [here->http://www.jensense.com/archives/2005/09/new_ad_category.html] with all the details. But what seems clear to me is that this should greatly improve ad relevancy in those difficult cases where the same vocabulary is used in different industries or in relation to diverse subjects.

This is not the best example, but all I can come up with right now and good enough to illustrate my point:

Does “cat jewelry” mean jewelry with images of cats, or jewelry worn by cats?

Will a visitor to a page focusing on “cat jewelry� be more interested in ads related to cats [like this site->http://www.catsplay.com/pet_jewelry.php3] (ID collars, feeding bowls), or ads related to jewelry [like this site->http://www.efsterling.com/] (cat earrings, gold chains)?

Obvious to a human visitor who can see the images, etc., and who probably navigated to the page already knowing its topic. But not so to the spider if there is little secondary text on the page or if it’s not consistent enough to identify an overall theme to tie the key phrases to. I often see mistakes of this kind even with Adsense. A category filter would prevent it. And that would obviously improve relevancy leading to a better CTR.

Google Adsense on the other hand added [section targeting->http://www.google.com/support/adsense/bin/answer.py?answer=23168&topic=371] a few weeks ago to help webmasters improve the CTR of displayed ads. It involves putting sections of your page source code between pairs of special adsense comment tags so the mediabot can register your desire to have Adsense emphasize or downplay that particular content, depending on the tag used.

For example, you would generally want to mark your page content (or perhaps the most theme focused few paragraphs) to be emphasized when selecting what ads to display, and recurring text elements like your navigation and page footer to play less of a role.

That should definately be a great help for improved ad relevancy, but it’s a lot more trouble than selecting a couple of categories if you use plain old HTML pages. I can’t see webmasters who have hundreds of static pages editing them all to have Adsense comment tags. It should be a breeze for those with template driven sites though.

What would be really nice is if both YPN and Adsense end up offering both options.

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