AdSense Custom Channels Guide Content, Grow Revenue
The AdSense custom channels report is a useful guide for targeting website content with revenue initiatives.
Publishers may use the report to track AdSense results based on the placement location of ads, size of ads and type of content.
The report is available by going to the Reports page available as a click in the left column of the AdSense homepage. From there, scroll down the left column and click on “Custom Channels”.
The odds are good the report is empty if the publisher hasn’t created a URL custom channel. These are publisher-created reports rather than default reports.
How to Create a Custom Channel
To create a report, click on the gear icon in the upper right of the Custom Channels page and then on Manage Custom Channels.
On the new page, click on the blue Add Channels button. Select the product and create the channel name. Underneath, scroll down and choose the ad units that need to appear in the report.
At this point, a custom channel report for that section or page won’t appear yet. It takes about a day for AdSense to start processing the information. Even after a day, the report isn’t useful because data from just a day or two is too subject to variations. Seven days is better, and 30 day or more are even better. The longer the period, the more useful the report.
Once enough data is available, go back to Reports / Custom Channels to see the results. The report will default to total revenue for each section or page. It is more interesting to rerank the page according to other statistics such as:
- Clicks
- Page RPM
- Impression RPM
Likewise, another useful data point is available for anyone who clicks on the Clicks tab near the top to look at average cost per click.
All of these data points help create a picture of the Adsense performance for any URL on the site. Over time, they show which ones are the most lucrative and which one’s aren’t.
AdSense Content Strategy Tips
With that information, publishers can focus their efforts on the channels with the best revenue results.
This information helps the development of an AdSense content strategy. It is a guide for a publisher to decide which areas of the site are worthy of more content development.
Such a strategy does have a few limitations. Publishers may want to make sure they don’t overdevelop certain areas on the site that weaken the brand. They also should make sure these sections are attractive to visitors and search engines.
Likewise, popular content without high RPMs may just produce large volumes of revenue at lower RPMs.
It doesn’t do a site much good to chase after a high RPM for a section that gets only 10 visitors a month. So publishers should balance these insights with brand, content and marketing ideas.
If a section consistently has low audience and high RPMs, then it’s a question of what a publisher might do to increase the audience. Useful tactics include search engine optimization.