#AdsenseWednesdays: ‘Contributor’ as a Solution to Ad Blocking

Kean Graham

9 years ago

This post was most recently updated on August 2nd, 2019

Adblocking is one of the greatest threats in the online advertising industry of today. Based on a recent June 2015 research, 198 million users are using ad blockers – mostly Millenials. Once this continues, the whole online advertising industry is predicted to suffer unsustainability. Adding insult to the injury is Apple’s new iOS where iPhone users can use an ad-blocking tool under their fingertips.

How does this affect publishers?

As publisher revenue is threatened, there will be fewer resources put into creating content. An expected scenario would be the proliferation of paid subscription – where only paying readers can access once-free-for-all-content.

Here comes the ‘Contributor’ solution

We assumed that Google is working its way in augmenting publisher revenue due to adblocking. AdSense has found a means to help publishers minimize the negative effect of ad blockers by rolling out a product they call as the “Contributor”.

The Contributor program helps Adsense publishers continue to create great content for readers. Essentially, your visitor can help you fund for your content every time they block or remove an ad by setting up a monthly contribution.

For you to be able to spread the word about this new revenue source, promote Contributor on your site through the following steps:

1) Contributor Badge

Putting the badge on your site will let your visitors know that they can help you fund your content. Here’s how the badge looks like. It has two color themes: one is darker and the other one is lighter.

To display this badge on your site, follow these steps:

Add the script to your page:

<script src=”https://www.gstatic.com/xads/publisher_badge/contributor_badge.js” data-width=”88″ data-height=”31″ data-theme=”light” data-pub-name=”Your Site Name” data-pub-id=”ca-pub-00000000000″></script>

You can specify the following:

width // int (size in pixels)
height // int (size in pixels)
theme // string: (“light” or “dark”)
pub-name // string (max length: 16 chars)
pub-id // string (use your pub id; example: ca-pub-1234567890)

2) House Ads

You can also promote the Contributor as your House ad. To give you an idea of how it will look like, here’s an example:

To do this, follow the steps below:

Choose a specific size
Link your ad to the Contributor site using the following URL:

https://www.google.com/contributor/welcome/?utm_source=publisher&utm_medium=banner&utm_campaign=your_pub_ID, where an example pub ID is ca-pub-1234567890

3) Blog or Announcement

Lastly, you can simply promote the Contributor by doing a simple blog post about it. Below are some of the facts from Google AdSense that you may use in your announcement:

Contributor works on a lot of sites. When users sign up, they’ll get the Contributor experience on your site and all other compatible sites.
Contributor only works on Google ads and is subject to the same auction mechanics as any other advertiser. So we don’t guarantee users a 100% ad-free experience, even on sites that only run Google ads.

The Need for outsourced ad optimization

Though the Contributor can help publishers, this can only minimize the effect of the ad blockers. Plus, this ‘Contributor’ scheme seems highly dependent on your site’s level of traffic. It is still important to have a dedicated ad optimizer who can maximize your ads’ full revenue potential given the same amount of traffic and number of ads on each page. Monetizemore can surely help you in handling your site properly and focus on optimizing your ads to its full potential.

Contact us today so we can further discuss how we can help you. Sign-up for FREE to Ad Exchange, or apply as our Premium Publisher.

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Kean Graham

Kean Graham is the CEO and founder of MonetizeMore & a pioneer in the Adtech Industry. He is the resident expert in Ad Optimization, covering areas like Adsense Optimization,GAM Management, and third-party ad network partnerships. Kean believes in the supremacy of direct publisher deals and holistic optimization as keys to effective and consistent ad revenue increases.