Remove Unwanted Google Adsense Ads

For many years, this blog has evolved in its content. It essentially started out as a personal journal to document my progress as a recreational swimmer.

As is typical with many other blogs, the blog also saw blog entries that covered a wide variety of topics.

Other than swimming, some of the topics that have been covered in the blog entries include Toastmasters, fitness, physical therapy, gardening, home improvement and family life, among others.

In the years that I've written those blog entries, I've mostly been satisfied with the Google ads that have appeared on the website.


Use Section Targeting Ads

This is thanks largely to a Google Adsense technique I've implemented called "Section Targeting". You can find more details in the Google Adsense website.

Basically, what it entails is tweaking your blog's html code. First, you locate the part or section your blog's html code that will contain your blog post. Then you insert two lines of code that will "switch-on" and "switch-off" Google Adsense section targeting.

What this means is that the switch-on line in the html code tells Google to start looking for the text that will be the basis for context-relevant Google ads. The switch-off line in your html code signals Google the end of the text.


Effect of the New Domain Name

For many years, I've been using isjaw.blogspot.com as my url. Although I could be happier with the Google Adsense ads that Google has been serving (some are PSA's or Public Service Ads), they're generally within context.

Last month, I bought a new domain name for this blog from Godaddy.com. The domain name is blackdovenest.com. Immediately, many of my old posts started showing up with ads that totally had nothing to do with the post content - in other words, irrelevant ads. Many of them would have words like "birds", "pigeons" and "avian".




I concluded that the new domain name was pulling these kind of ads, in spite of section targeting ads. Apparently, the domain name was much a stronger factor than content in determining the keywords for serving ads.


Exclude Irrelevant Google Ads by Using Filters

Searching the web that will enable me to exclude words in the Google ads did not yield satisfactory results. I already had the list of words that I was ready to supply Google Adsense based on my findings on the new domain name.

There is a Category Filter that allows you to exclude a CATEGORY OF ADS from appearing. In all, there are 11 category filters as of this writing.

These include Cosmetic procedures and surgery, Dating, Drugs and supplements, Get rich quick, and a few others. Unfortunately, the list is limited and the ads that I wanted to block aren't in that category list.

There is a facility that would allow you to block SPECIFIC ADVERTISERS. This is through the use of the Competitive Ads Filter of Google Adsense. The Competitive Ads Filter allows you to submit the URL's of ads that you do not want to appear.

Originally, this was meant for business websites who do not want competitors to advertise their competing products or services in the website. It's close enough though to allow you to block irrelevant ads from specific advertisers.

To use this filter for your purpose, you simply pick up the URL's of the irrelevant ads that you don't want to appear. The URL can easily be seen as the bottom line of most ads and is in small text.

For link ads, you may click the link to find the underlying advertisers. Be careful though to NOT actually click on them.

You then enter these URL's in the filter box provided, one URL per line. Save the changes, and you've excluded the URL's that serve irrelevant ads.



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