Google AdSense for Beginners

Google AdSense is a way to rent out your online real-estate and make money.

Your online real-estate could be a personal website, a blog, or just articles that you write on HubPages, or some other online writing site.

As with physical real-estate, the rent you get will be dependent on the quality of your property. Some properties are well located and well maintained; while others are dirty and delapidated.

Google AdSense, however, will only pay you when visitors click on the advertisements they put on your online pages.

How much money can you make with Google AdSense?

Well that would depend on the quality of your content. The better the online property, the more visitor activity, which would lead to greater returns.

Realize though that most people will earn very little initially. Even good writers will start off with relatively low Google AdSense earnings while they learn how to market their content online.

These Google AdSense earnings trajectories will give you an idea of what to expect from an earnings perspective.

If you think that you would like to share some of your ideas online, have some fun, and make some money, then you may want to join Google AdSense.

In the application process, you will need to provide Google with a website (URL) where they get to see some examples of your content. According to the people in the know, your chances for getting Google AdSense approval will be higher if you use a Blogger site in your Google AdSense application.

Therefore, you may want to first join Blogger and start a blog. Make at least a few good English postings before submitting it in your Google AdSense application. If you are considering copying your content from someone else, then know that plagiarising content is against Google AdSense's Terms of Service.

"Thou shalt not steal" is also in most of the major holy books. Are a few bucks really worth eternal damnation?

The amount of time it takes for Google AdSense approval will vary from application to application. Mine took a couple of days. While you are waiting, make sure to continue updating your blog, and write at least one post every day. Once you get approval, you can relax your blogging schedule.

If you are interested in linking your HubPages account to Google AdSense, then here is a great step by step guide from the HubPages team.

Note - It is against AdSense TOS to get more than one account so only apply for one Google AdSense account.

This may all sound like a lot of work, but the application forms are really very simple to complete. On a scale of 1 to 10 where 10 is a visit to the dentist and 1 is vegging out in front of the t.v. I would rate this at around a 3.

If you are part of HubPages, Google AdSense advertisements will automatically get integrated into your hubs. That saves you the trouble of mucking around with AdSense advertisement creation, AdSense advertisement placement, and modifying HTML code.

Integrating Google AdSense with your Blogger blog is also a simple affair. Simply follow these instructions from Google.

Adding Google AdSense advertisements into your self-hosted website is a bit more complex, and will not be covered in this beginner's guide.

Now comes the best part - looking at how much you have earned. Log into your brand new Google AdSense account, and you will be presented with a Google AdSense report.

Your Google AdSense report contains the following important information - Page impressions (number of views), Number of Clicks , CTR , eCPM, and Earnings.

CTR means Click Through Rate and eCPM which means effective Cost per Thousand Impressions.

CTR tells you the percentage of visitors that clicked on a Google AdSense advertisement. A CTR of 100% means that every visitor that entered your Google AdSense article(s) clicked on an advertisement.

eCPM tells you how much your articles can earn per thousand impressions. The advertisements for your online articles can vary within a big range. eCPM gives you an average measure of how much your article can earn for every thousand visitors.

Publishing your Google AdSense CTR and eCPM is against Google AdSense TOS. Therefore, do not publish these statistics anywhere, not even in your screenshots.

Initially, all of your Google AdSense enabled pages, including all of your hubs from HubPages, your blog pages, and your personal website pages are in the same group/channel in your Google AdSense report.

To better analyze your Google AdSense earnings, you probably want to divide some of these pages into different channels.

Some people put each and every one of their articles (i.e. web page) on a separate channel. However, Google Analytics already tracks page by page information for you, so it is easier to just track your AdSense earnings from individual articles through Google Analytics.

What you may wish to do, is to create separate Google AdSense Channels for your personal website, your personal blog, your external blogs (e.g. Blogger, or Webpress), and each of the online writing sites you participate in (e.g. hubpages.com).

Here is a step by step guide on how to create channels in Google AdSense:

1. Log into your Google AdSense account.
2. Click on the AdSense Setup tab at the top of your Google AdSense window.
3. Click on Channels.
4. Under AdSense for Content select URL channels.
5. Select + Add new URL channels.
6. Type in each of the URLs you want to track in a separate line. For example, I have typed in the URL of my personal blog - shibashake.com/shibainublog
7. Click the Add Channels button.

Custom channels allow you to track specific Google AdSense advertisements or groups of Google Adsense advertisements. It is only relevant if are in control of creating and placing your own AdSense advertisements, for example in your personal hosted website. It is not relevant for HubPages users.

Another very useful feature in Google AdSense is the Competitive Ad Filter option. This feature allows you to list all of the websites that you do not want to receive Google AdSense advertisements from.

You may wonder why you would want to do such a thing since that may limit your AdSense earnings. Nevertheless some advertisements may just be too distracting and may ruin the look of your article, others may be from groups (religious, political, or something else) that you really disagree with.

Here is a step by step guide on how to filter out unwanted Google AdSense ads.

1. Log into your Google AdSense account.
2. Click on the AdSense Setup tab at the top of your Google AdSense window.
3. Click on the Competitive Ad Filter link which is directly to the right of the Channels link.
4. Make sure AdSense for Content is selected.
5. Enter all the URLs you would like to filter out. One URL per line.
6. Click on the Save Changes button.

If there is a particular advertisement in one of your articles that you would like to filter out, here are Google's instructions on how to block particular ads.

This is it!

Now you are ready to make your riches from home with Google AdSense. Make sure to review these Google AdSense program policies carefully to avoid getting banned from Google AdSense.

Join HubPages and start making money with Google AdSense.