Friday, 30 October 2009
Thursday, 29 October 2009
A more customized search experience for your website
We've posted a couple times about how the Custom Search Element can help provide a more customized search experience for your users while enabling you to earn money. Today we're excited to announce two new features for the Custom Search Element that will enable you to further customize your website search to the look and feel of your site: themes and rich snippets.
Themes
You can now customize the layout and styles of your Custom Search Element. To select a theme for your Custom Search Element, just go to your Custom Search Engine account at http://www.google.com/cse/manage/all and click Control panel. On the Control panel page, in the left-hand menu, click Look and feel.
You can now choose from a number of layouts and color styles for your Custom Search Element. You can also preview your selected theme. Here's an example of the 'Shiny' theme:
If you'd like to tinker further with the look and feel of your Custom Search Element and you're familiar with CSS and JavaScript, take a look at this Custom Search Control documentation.
Rich snippets
Rich snippets are another new feature that allow you to customize the actual Custom Search Element search results with additional relevant content, like thumbnail images and actions. We like to think of rich snippets as a way to add more flair to your Custom Search Element search results.
Here's an example of search results from a Custom Search Element which uses both themes and rich snippets. The thumbnail image next to each search result shows rich snippets in action.
Rich snippets require you to mark up the page with metadata. For more information, check out the Custom Search Developer's Guide.
If you have any feedback for us on either of these new features or on the Custom Search Element itself, please leave a comment. We love hearing what publishers have to say about Custom Search!
Themes
You can now customize the layout and styles of your Custom Search Element. To select a theme for your Custom Search Element, just go to your Custom Search Engine account at http://www.google.com/cse/manage/all and click Control panel. On the Control panel page, in the left-hand menu, click Look and feel.
You can now choose from a number of layouts and color styles for your Custom Search Element. You can also preview your selected theme. Here's an example of the 'Shiny' theme:
If you'd like to tinker further with the look and feel of your Custom Search Element and you're familiar with CSS and JavaScript, take a look at this Custom Search Control documentation.
Rich snippets
Rich snippets are another new feature that allow you to customize the actual Custom Search Element search results with additional relevant content, like thumbnail images and actions. We like to think of rich snippets as a way to add more flair to your Custom Search Element search results.
Here's an example of search results from a Custom Search Element which uses both themes and rich snippets. The thumbnail image next to each search result shows rich snippets in action.
Rich snippets require you to mark up the page with metadata. For more information, check out the Custom Search Developer's Guide.
If you have any feedback for us on either of these new features or on the Custom Search Element itself, please leave a comment. We love hearing what publishers have to say about Custom Search!
Wednesday, 28 October 2009
Coming soon: Filter more categories
A few months ago, we launched category filtering in a number of English-speaking countries to help you control the ads that appear on your pages. To provide you with more ad filtering options, you'll soon be able to filter 3 more categories from your pages, for a total of up to 8 categories. You should notice this change within the next few weeks.
To get started with category filtering, sign in to AdSense and visit the Ad Review Center, located under the AdSense Setup tab. You can choose from the listed categories, which include religion, politics, and dating, and your selections will be applied to ads in English no matter how they're targeted. Please keep in mind that filtering ad categories may affect your AdSense revenue -- we recommend first reviewing the percentages displayed in your account to understand the amount of revenue you may be blocking.
We're continuing to work on additional filtering capabilities, and we appreciate all the feedback you've provided so far. Feel free to leave us a comment, and visit our Help Center to learn more about category filtering.
To get started with category filtering, sign in to AdSense and visit the Ad Review Center, located under the AdSense Setup tab. You can choose from the listed categories, which include religion, politics, and dating, and your selections will be applied to ads in English no matter how they're targeted. Please keep in mind that filtering ad categories may affect your AdSense revenue -- we recommend first reviewing the percentages displayed in your account to understand the amount of revenue you may be blocking.
We're continuing to work on additional filtering capabilities, and we appreciate all the feedback you've provided so far. Feel free to leave us a comment, and visit our Help Center to learn more about category filtering.
Wednesday, 21 October 2009
A learning opportunity for education sites
This Thursday, October 22nd, our Dublin-based AdSense team will host a webinar geared towards publishers with sites related to education. We welcome you to join us for an hour, starting at 9am PST/5pm GMT, and learn how you can improve your ad performance. We'll talk you through our top tips and show you sample implementations, and you'll be able to put your questions live to an AdSense specialist. Please be sure to sign up via our Help Center if you're planning to attend.
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