The most innovative feature of Google Adsense is that website owners no longer have to trawl through adverts from numerous affiliate companies to place on their sites in the forlorn hope that someone will click on the advert then make a purchase from the site they land on to earn commission. Maybe they will, maybe they won't, but then comes that email from the affiliate company stating that the advertiser has left the programme etc and that all adverts will have to be changed.

The brilliance of Adsense is that you put a code onto your website of a certain size (and there are many to choose from) and that advert will self update for life, so even if advertisers come and go, the advert will always (well nearly always) be advertising something of interest to visitors on the website page. So let's say you have a page selling kitchen utensils. Clearly you cannot display every kitchen utensil on the market, but you do know someone visiting that page will, in the main, be interested in purchasing something in the kitchen utensils line. They look at your wares, but what they're looking for cannot be found. But hey, not all is lost, for you have Google Ads on your site, so the customer, rather then performing another search, clicks on a related kitchen utensils ad ,and hey presto, you make money! (And hopefully so does the person whose advert was clicked on.)

Too good to be true? Well, yes actually, but it is good. It does have a few downsides though. Once accepted onto the Google Ads programme, you start thinking, 'hey I'm going to make megabucks out of this (no, you're not) and you tell all your friends and family about it. You make you're first few cents and want more. This is money for nothing. You redesign your entire site around Google Ads to get them into the best positions on your pages for maximizing revenue and then, ouch! Someone, maybe known to you, maybe a competitor, maybe just someone being mischievous, repeated clicks on your Google Ads and before you know it, you're banned from the programme (for life - not your site, YOU) and you're left with a wreck of a website strewn with defunct spaces where once Google Ads were displayed proudly. You've done nothing wrong, but that's it, its over. No more revenue and possible weeks ahead of rewriting your site to remove the spaces where the ads were displayed.

Google are understandably harsh when it comes to what they deem 'invalid clicks' and quickly boot people off the Adsense programme. They have extremely sophisticated software backed up by human researchers who constantly monitor for invalid clicks and if they see a spike in the number of clicks you are generating are quick to investigate and pull the plug if they suspect foul play. After all, advertisers are paying to have potential paying customers to their sites, they're not paying for worthless repeated clicks, nor, God Forbid, and yes it does happen all to regularly, for website owners to make a few extra cents from their websites from clicking adverts displayed on their own sites. After all they wouldn't hurt would it. YES, it is called fraud.

What we like about Google Adsense is that we want everyone visiting our sites to go away having had their needs met, for that it is a sure way of getting them back again. If we can't meet their needs, there will be signposts on our sites displaying adverts where their needs might be met - and if we make a bit of money by doing so, all the better. BUT to create a website, as so many seem to be doing, simply to display ads, simply isn't going to work, for your website will have no soul. Sorry if that sounds a little crazy, but web surfers can spot an advert orientated site a mile off and your ranking and hits will haunt the bottom end of the search results for eternity (or until you don't rehost the domain when it comes up for renewal - whatever comes earlier.)

No, Google Adsense is a worthy ADDITION to a site, but that should be it. If you make a few dollars great, if you don't, that should be okay as well. We would strongly recommend that before you start redesigning your site to take Adsense you make a back-up copy of your site as it is. We recommend this for if for some reason you're not happy with the programme - or they're not happy with you, you can simply and quickly upload the old copy of your site and move on both financially and emotionally.

Google Adsense have a forum which is packed with despairing website owners bewailing their lot when they've had their accounts closed for invalid clicks, and no longer have the heart or the energy to rebuild their site. Think of this as a bit like the RESTORE function in Windows, you're simply restoring your website to its former self, quickly, efficiently and painlessly.

As for earnings, well its a condition of Google Adsense Terms of Service (if you're thinking about signing up, we recommend you read these VERY carefully to ensure your website is fully compliant) that we simply can't advise you on this!! But as a rule of thumb, don't bank on earnings, just be happy when you make some cash, but never rely upon Adsense as a source of income. Here's the link: