Google Ads

[satay]

namaste everyone,
As you have noticed we now have google ads on our HDF forum.

Most of you who know me long enough know that I started this forum saying that this would be an ad free community. As you can see, my thoughts on that have changed and I feel that I have an obligation to provide an explanation of my decision.

There are a couple of reasons to have google ads:
1. I noticed on other forums that google ads are customized to the point where they can actually be useful to the members visiting the forum.
2. Ads can be customized to only links and text forms. Links and text ads are not annoying like the flash image ads.

But the main reason of my decision to have ads on our forum is this:
I felt that even though I have the forum setup I should be doing a little more for hinduism and hindus. I am personally unable to do anything for the hindu community that will make any kind of meaningful seva. I felt that more should be done.

So therefore, the income generated by the click of ads will all be donated to the hindu organizations or charities or anyone that I feel could use the money or simply it will be donated to hindu sadhus or to mandirs in india or here in canada.

Unfortunately, all you have to go by my word on this as I can not disclose the actual earnings to anyone. However, I can tell you that right now there is almost zero since the ads were introduced about a week ago. I am not sure how the earnings work or that even if there will be any from the ads but be assured that everything will go to the cause of hinduism.

I value each and everyone of your opinion so please do not hold back and let me know if you do not agree with my thoughts on this.

In Dharma,

[satay]

namaste everyone,
so the google ads have been up for a couple of weeks I think. My analysis of this so far is that the ads are not going to generate any meaningful amount of donkey's food for anything.

I am going to take the ads off this weekend, unless you guys find the links interesting.

Thoughts?

[Znanna]

What Google ads?

I've not seen any?

ZN

[satay]

What Google ads?

I've not seen any?

ZN

:)
that's because I only placed them in the new style i.e. the light blue shade style.

[Znanna]

Cool! What a great idea, satay.

Thank you for continuing to improve the site so nicely :)



Namaste,
ZN

[satay]

Namaskar!

As you noticed, tiny linked google ads are back on HDF.

I am trying to analyze if, by bringing these ads back, the google spider will crawl HDFPuri more frequently and in more depth. Will find out in about a week.

[sarabhanga]

Namaste Satay,

You have made the Ads about as unobtrusive as possible, and they certainly will help with Google's indexing of the site (every page that anyone views will automatically prompt Google to scan that page, and its links) and so long as the Ad titles stay tuned in to our basic aim and key words (such as hinduism, hindu, dharma, sanatana, etc.) they will improve search-engine ranking for such terms. Although a string of Ads such as Hindu Dating, Hindu Singles, Hindu Matchmaking, Hindu Personals, seems inappropriate ~ is there any way to exclude certain terms? Or perhaps other members have no objection to a line of such links in the heading of every second page that is viewed (?)

[c.smith]

Namaste Satay,

Thank-you for always being one step ahead. I feel that targeted Google ads aren't such a bad idea, especially given your generous intentions. I would be among the first to click on an ad that I found beneficial in terms of service or information, but I've yet to see an ad. Am I somehow missing something?

[satay]

Namaskar!



Although a string of Ads such as Hindu Dating, Hindu Singles, Hindu Matchmaking, Hindu Personals, seems inappropriate ~ is there any way to exclude certain terms? Or perhaps other members have no objection to a line of such links in the heading of every second page that is viewed (?)

Yes, actually, I find the current google ads of personal matchmaking annoying and inappropriate for the theme of HDF.

I am not sure how the google spider 'thought' of these ads by looking at our front page! I notice that the adsense spider has been scanning the site continously since I put up the ads. I am in hopes that the spider engine will use its smarts and the personal matchmaking ads will be changed to something like 'vedic books' 'vedas' or something along those lines. I remember that previously, the ads on the front page were along these lines.

I will see if there is a way to exclude certain types of ads.

Thanks,

[satay]

Namaste Satay,

Thank-you for always being one step ahead. I feel that targeted Google ads aren't such a bad idea, especially given your generous intentions. I would be among the first to click on an ad that I found beneficial in terms of service or information, but I've yet to see an ad. Am I somehow missing something?

Thanks C. Smith for the kind words. However, only click on the ads if you find them beneficial. 'Encouraging' to click on ads is against the policies of Google and thus I do not encourage anyone to click on the ads.

As previously mentioned elsewhere on these forums, I am in no need of 'earning' donkey's food by using HDF.

The forum runs with his grace and will, which works through all of you posters, to provide a nice place on the net for dharma adherents.

[sarabhanga]

Namaste Satay,

I assume that the Ads are automatically chosen for each page based on the content of that page. And a scan of our index page reveals (as well as our expected keywords) all of the following terms:

community, chat, introduce yourself, talk, love, affairs here, poetry, music, society, relax, announcements, notices, share, problem, photos, guest, joining, attached, respond, communicate privately, answer, joys, general notices, general discussion, related websites, cup of tea, remember me

So the system returns hopefully related Ads like "Hindu dating", "Sanatana matchmaking", "Zen singles", etc. :doh:

[c.smith]

Namaste all,

I've discovered why the ads weren't displaying while reading through the forum posts. I use the Firefox browser and an extension called "Ad Block Plus". This feature must be disabled to view the ads. Now I can agree with others who have noted that the ads are minimal, but also show concern for the "matchmaking" potential. Somehow I'm certain that clever Satay will work out the details. Again, I applaud him for his efforts.

[sarabhanga]

Namaste,

I doubt that small changes on our front page will actually make much difference, but we will have to wait for the thread "YOUNG and SEXUAL" to fade from view to be sure.

It probably has more to do with the nature of this site. We use the lofty title "Discussion Forum", but from a robot's perspective it is little different from a "Chat Room". And the most common theme for internet chat rooms is probably dating and matchmaking for singles! So, a very general page (such as our forum index) is perhaps difficult to classify as anything other than a general chat room, which consequently gets Ads related to the general chat room theme, only tempered with the specific addition of "Hindu".

[satay]

Namaskar,

So far I have added about 200 sites to the adsense filter. The filter helps us exclude certain sites. We will wait and see if this helps.

In the meantime, I will see if there is anything we can do to the young and sexual... so to speak. :)

[Eastern Mind]

Namaskar,

So far I have added about 200 sites to the adsense filter. The filter helps us exclude certain sites. We will wait and see if this helps.

In the meantime, I will see if there is anything we can do to the young and sexual... so to speak. :)

Hey some humor, so to speak. I hardly notice the ads, but how is money generated? Do you get money every time someone hits one of the ads, or do we actually have to go to the site, and download, or view, or make a purchase? If we get paid just by clicking on one of the ads, I'll click away all day, just like some ol' chicken. Oops, demeaning a life form there. Aum Namasivaya

[satay]

namaste satay,


Hey some humor, so to speak. I hardly notice the ads, but how is money generated? Do you get money every time someone hits one of the ads, or do we actually have to go to the site, and download, or view, or make a purchase? If we get paid just by clicking on one of the ads, I'll click away all day, just like some ol' chicken. Oops, demeaning a life form there. Aum Namasivaya

No, I don't get any money. I figured out last year that we are too small a group to generate any kind of donkey's food. The ads are back on the site because I am trying to see if the adsense bot helps the google spider crawl our site more frequently, in depth and if our page rankings in google search gets better. Although google claims that adsense doesn't help in page rankings etc. but I want to confirm this for myself.

Please do not click on any ads that don't interest you.

[satay]

Hmm...I might be imagining this but it seems that the google spider has been very active on HDF since I put the ads back on the site. This shouldn't be happening if we follow what Google claims on their site...

:headscratch:

[satay]

namaskar Sarabhanga,
Thank you for doing all the work for improving our ranks in google search!

[satay]

Since google adsense bot is too dumb to understand (even after several days) what the first page of HDF is about, the linked ads at the top have been removed.

[sarabhanga]

Namaste Satay,

No ads at the top is even better! I would guess that Google has less than half of our total content currently indexed, so the AdSense robot (which scans every page that is viewed, and every new post) will certainly help. And I assume that the normal Google robots will still be crawling around just as before. The ads won't make any difference to Google's ranking of a page, but their presence will improve Google's indexing of pages.

Best wishes to you, and the whole HDF family, for 2008. :)

[Nuno Matos]

Namaste All

" No ads at the top is even better!"

And I subscribe that!