This post isn’t really about stocks or investing, but it has a direct effect on me and my wealth. So here it is.

As someone that is working on several web projects and trying to improve his first blog, I have noticed some really interesting things regarding Google Adsense and how it works.

The problem I have experienced is that, since I tend to write posts on a variety of topics– everything from blogging to stocks to eBay– my home page could become cluttered with posts of varied topics.

And that hurts my contextual advertising (Google Adsense).

I recently posted several blog entries about airplanes, but the ads are still targeted to an old post about kites. How can I get AdSense to show ads about airplanes?

-from the Inside AdSense mail bag

Google does their best to keep the ads relevant. And I believe that they are excellent. If I were to individually view any one post on my site, I would venture that the ads are ideal over 99% of the time. The only place they are not perfect is my home page, which often has posts on a few different topics.

Last week, Adsense made a small change to its program that was discussed on their weblog. By allowing webmasters to add HTML comments surrounding areas of text, webmasters can highlight specify areas of the page that are most relevant to their advertisements.

What is funny about the whole thing was that I exchanged e-mails Adsense customer service last week about this same topic.

My concern was that I had written a post about a block of money being auctioned off on eBay, and that had caused all of my classified advertisements to be targeted for eBay. That post had disappeared from my home page, but the advertisements for auction services remained.

Google’s response was that they are doing the best that they can. They really are. And, after another day or two, the ads changed.

So what have I learned from this experience?

1. Google Adsense ads are great. And they are relevant to whatever content they see when they scan your web site.
2. When the Adsense bot scans your web site, it takes a sort of snapshot of the content and keywords you use. With millions of sites using Adsense, keeping this data up to date is no small feat for Google.
3. If you stray from your niche, the ads will no longer be relevant until the Adsense bot’s next update. For blogs like mine this seems to take place every couple of days.
4. The key to maximizing your advertising revenue, it seems, is to keep all of your posts on your blog within your desired niche. I have heard that it pays to specialize for your blog, and it would seem that this is why.

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