Adsense Ads and Services Policy Tightened

Adsense for a while has been fairly strict about sharing the same webpage with other contextual ad programs, but it seems they have tightened it a little more.

They have just updated their adsense policy and said

Competitive Ads and Services In order to prevent user confusion, we do not permit Google ads or search boxes to be published on websites that also contain other ads or services formatted to use the same layout and colors as the Google ads or search boxes on that site. Although you may sell ads directly on your site, it is your responsibility to ensure these ads cannot be confused with Google ads.

So what does all this mean to you? well if you have up to now been running adsense and yahoos version on a 50/50 rotation using the same or similar color palettes, you can kiss that goodbye as that is a violation of adsense polices. If you also have adsense and yahoo on your site but on different pages using the same colour palettes.. that also is a no no.

This doesnt just apply to yahoo though.. it applies to other things on your site which mimic in anyway adsense in layout and appearance. i.e Affiliate Links or if your selling text ads you would be in violation of their terms aswell.

So what can be done? Make sure if you are running yahoo and adsense on your site, make sure their is a clear difference between the two in colour and layout. This is a site wide thing, bear that in mind.. its not just on one single page.. it applies to your entire site.

I can understand this, they started this whole method of earning income and they want to continue leading the way as people like yahoo compete for publishers and msn when they come out with theirs.

Technorati Tags: Adsense, Business, News, Google