AdSense Ad Formats -Text, Image and Rich Media – Which Earns More

AdSense Ad formats can be like Text, Image and Rich Media. For the normal Google AdSense Publishers, Google AdSense allows to restrict the type of Advert to be served. It is an age old question that often asked by the webmasters – which AdSense Ad Formats work better or AdSense Ad Formats earns better.

What Google says about AdSense Ad Formats ?

Google display network clearly states that images and rich media works better. This statement is for the Advertisers.

Our data shows (we often restrict the AdSense Ad Formats for any unit to perform A/B variation tests) Rich Media earns the most, however there is no option in normal Google AdSense Publishers account to allow only this kind of AdSense Ad Formats. Next is image format. Text, though often have higher CTR for us, it is usually a poor earner.

Factors influencing revenue and CTR of AdSense Ad Formats

For a Text only page, Text Ad works better due to proper and exact blending with surrounding text. For colorful pages with few images, Text Ads are often ignored (Ad Blindness).

Other factors which makes Rich Media / Text AdSense Ad Formats a better earner

Text ad needs proper call to action text. Its Adveriser dependent.

Publishers can not ‘enhance’ AdSense Ad Formats or units in any way. Google thinks that it is unethical to decorate AdSense Ad Formats or units by the publishers after a certain level. What ever we think does not matter, in order to use AdSense we have to obey it. For the text AdSense Ad Formats, we are fully dependent on the Advertiser’s competency of marketing.
But, for image /Rich Media AdSense Ad Formats, the Ads themselves are colorful, often have Click Me, Click Here buttons which flickers. Keep in mind, it is the text AdSense Ad Formats for which Google is too much sensitive, simply because they can be used to ‘get false clicks’.

Other factor is that, if you try to click some other’s Text AdSense Ad Formats, you will notice that there are areas which are not clickable – For Image and Flash AdSense Ad Formats, position of click does not matter. I personally have tested it by clicking different AdSense Ad Formats on other’s website. So if the visitor clicks outside the non clickable area, it is actually not clicked.

Another factor is, Image / Rich Media AdSense Ad Formats are often used by professional websites and brands, with a higher cap on bidding. You can read our article on the size of better performing AdSense Ad Formats.