This algorithmic change does not affect sites who place ads above-the-fold to a normal degree, but affects sites that go much further to load the top of the page with ads to an excessive degree or that make it hard to find the actual original content on the page. This new algorithmic improvement tends to impact sites where there is only a small amount of visible content above-the-fold or relevant content is persistently pushed down by large blocks of ads.
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2012/01/page-layout-algorithm-improvement.html
ok, who's going to say it?
I'll avoid the obvious (http://searchengineland.com/figz/wp-content/seloads/2012/01/6728099139_d5444820cf_z-600x351.jpg)... and go for the almost as obvious.
Adwords account manager was on the phone yesterday trying very hard to get me to cram more adblocks above the fold on 2 of our sites. On both of these we have been trying to slowly reduce the ads (compensating with traffic gains) to stop them seeming quite so spammy.
so - what's peoples opinion on this bit?
Quote....So sites that don't have much content "above-the-fold" can be affected by this change. If you click on a website and the part of the website you see first either doesn't have a lot of visible content above-the-fold or ...
Our designers absolutely *love* hero images (those big things which take up most of the space above the fold, sometimes rotating) I hate them because I think the bounce rate generally rises unless you're lucky enough to present the right image to the right person, especially on e-commerce sites.
Depending on what you want to believe that quote could be saying hero image = bad. Is that how the rest of you would read it, or am I trying to backup my argument and twisting it to fit?
My take on it is that Google will probably make some sort of token effort on downgrading some of the egregious examples of publishers stuffing Adsense above the fold, but more pertinently if I was running ads aggressively from say Adbrite or any of the other networks I would start to worry.
Paranoid? Perhaps.
So, is this working from the code, or the rendered page? Either way, you can spoof it, but obviously the technique would vary. Also, please let it be the rendered page. I can see stuff you can do with that
>Is that how the rest of you would read it, or am I trying to backup my argument and twisting it to fit?
Spin it to back your argument regardless - there are darn few Universal Truths in SEO anyway. Designers are fine people but they need guidance when they get carried away with gratuitous frills.
You've got to admit that aggressive ad placement is a pretty good fingerprint, though.
>Adwords account manager was on the phone yesterday trying very hard to get me to cram more adblocks above the fold
Hell, back when I was pushing X thousand impressions per day for adsense I'd routinely get emails asking me to increase the ads above the fold. Duplicity, thy name is Google. You'll see some call Matt out on that in the comments.
>if I was running ads aggressively from say Adbrite or any of the other networks I would start to worry
Ditto.
>rendered
My guess would be rendered, TT.
>Our designers absolutely *love* hero images I hate them
So now you have some ammunition, Gurtie.
>> My guess would be rendered, TT.
Mine too, because we all know where the "code" path leads. The problem of course is that there is rendering, and rendering. A rendering engine can only render that which it is given to render. For instance, googlebot doesn't have a mouse, so no focus.
I'm sure you can rig code to simulate focus, but simulation != to the real deal. Set a small delay between onfocus and response. If that doesn't work, tooltip EVERYTHING. Or do both, so the details of implementation are less important anyway
I have been only delivering ads to visitors with a referrer query string for ages now
not seen any ranking drops - but then adsense is not a big thing for me these days anyway
Referer + UA check (for browsers, not bots) would seem to be a good way to go. And there is a good argument that not including the ad code for non-capable browsers would be good practice anyway.