Upcoming changes in backup ad options

We frequently review our product and feature offerings to ensure they’re as effective as possible. Based on these reviews and on feedback from our non-profit partners, we’ll gradually begin retiring public service ads (PSAs) from AdSense sites so that we can focus our efforts on developing new opportunities for these partners.

As a refresher, PSAs are unpaid ads that can appear on publisher sites when we aren’t able to serve a paid ad. This can occur for a number of reasons, such as when relevant ads aren’t available for a page, or when a publisher has exceeded the amount of time to verify their address by receiving a Personal Identification Number.

As always, we’re committed to supporting our non-profit partners, which is why we’re continuing to offer free AdWords advertising for these partners via Google Grants; the Google Grants program is just one part of our larger Google for non-profits initiative. Also, ads in the Google Grants program are unaffected by this change. They'll continue to appear on AdSense sites and you'll earn from valid clicks and impressions, just like with normal ads. To learn more about the latest in Google Grants, including recent tips, events, and clinics, visit the official Google Grants blog.

What does this mean for you as a publisher? If you’ve previously selected ‘Show public service ads’ in the ‘Backup ads’ section of the new AdSense interface (or the ‘Alternate ads or colors’ section in the old AdSense interface), you’ll begin to see that when we’re unable to serve paid ads to your pages, a blank space will appear instead of a PSA. On the other hand, if you’ve opted to show non-Google ads from another URL or to show a solid color, you won’t be affected by this change; your choices will continue to be applied in cases when we aren’t able to show paid ads.

You’ll also notice that the option to select PSAs as backup ads no longer appears in your account. We’re working to provide new backup ad options, and will keep you updated with any developments right here on Inside AdSense.

If you’d like to update the settings for your backup ads at any time, sign in to your account and follow the instructions for the interface you’re using:

• New AdSense interface: Visit the My Ads page and select the ad unit you’d like to update. Then, change the settings for ‘Backup ads.’
• Old AdSense interface: Visit the Manage Ads page under the My Account tab, and click ‘Edit Ad Settings’ for the unit you’d like to change.

If you'd like to discuss this change with other publishers or provide feedback to our team, join the conversation in our Forum. We’ll be updating our Help Center entries and troubleshooters to reflect this change as well. Thanks for your patience as we complete this transition.

Posted by Yasser Abu-Ghdaib - AdSense Product Specialist

Western Union now in the Palestinian Territories

As part of our ongoing goal to provide more payment options around the world, we're very excited to announce the arrival of Western Union Quick Cash® payments for the Palestinian Territories (Gaza & the West Bank).

For those of you who aren't familiar with this form of payment, Western Union Quick Cash payments are free and will reach you faster than checks. Payments will continue to follow our normal payment schedule and will be available for pickup in your local currency at your local Western Union agent the day after they're issued.

A couple of things to note: We can send Western Union payments only to publishers that have an individual account at this time. Also, the payee name on your account must exactly match the government-issued ID card that you'll use when picking up your payments. For more information on how to sign up for and pick up Western Union payments, please visit our Help Center.

We're continually looking into the feasibility of introducing new forms of payment and new delivery options in different countries. Stay tuned to the blog as we work to improve the payments experience for publishers around the word!

Posted by Deborah Chang - AdSense Payments team

New Interface Wednesdays: Monthly graphs of your account performance

This is the second post in our ‘New Interface Wednesdays’ series. Every Wednesday for the next few months we will highlight something new you can do in the new AdSense interface. From time to time we’ll also share stories directly from publishers who have been using the new interface as well as announce additional features we’ve recently added.

In the next few posts in this series, we’ll focus on different types of reports you can quickly view in the new interface to monitor and gain insight into your ad performance. Today we’re highlighting the ability to quickly view performance by month. We’ve chosen this particular feature because it’s been a top request from publishers, but you can easily do the same by day or week.

Previously, the easiest way to view all account data by month was to export all reports to CSV, then post-process the data in a spreadsheet. Now you can get the same data with just two clicks without leaving your account. On the Performance reports tab, first click on 'More reports,' and then 'Entire account by month.' From here you can see a graph of your earnings. Immediately below the graph, you’ll see data for your account by month. As we mentioned last week, you can easily select the metrics to appear on the graph.



Give it a try today! Navigate to the new interface and click on the Performance reports tab, 'More reports,' and then 'Entire account by month.'

Posted by Vincent Zanotti - AdSense Engineer