Sure, social media is sexy but forums get it done. If you’re looking for expert, technical, or personal advice on Google AdSense you probably don’t want to broadcast it to the world on Facebook. That’s where Google AdSense forums come in and here’s a list of the three best ones.
What do you call a blog where comments can be as comprehensive as the post itself? I’m glad you asked. Well, of course, It’s a forum!
We go over lots of different sources of info in our research – many of them blogs. But there are also some fantastic resources in the forum world too. So I want to share with you some of the top forums for Google AdSense topics. Bonus points if these are already on your radar.
- Webmaster World
- Google AdSense Official Help Forum
- Warrior Forum
FYI – I’m also going to give you a tip on how to search more efficiently.
Forums vs blogs?
Ok, so If you really think about it, there isn’t really an immense difference between forums and blogs. A forum post can be a quick idea, comment, or question. But it can also be just as comprehensive as a fully researched blog post. More importantly, a good forum post can spark some excellent discussions.
Let’s work on an analogy. How does this work for you?
If a blog is a master class, then a forum is a round table discussion.
Here’s three of the top Google AdSense forums we like to keep an eye on. Occasionally I even fall asleep in bed with my Macbook on my stomach reading them… well… at least until I get the old gentle elbow-to-the-ribs reminder that my time is up! By the way, if you actually run and operate a forum, here’s how to monetize a forum.
Webmaster World: Google AdSense Category
Webmaster World is one of the top forums there is on a full gamut of topics. And it definitely deserves its top billing here for it’s Google AdSense category.
It’s a hub for the web’s top webmasters. So when questions related to AdSense monetization strategy come up, many of the answers come directly from experts. It’s hard to quantity the full value of the information. Let’s just say if you were hiring expert consultants for the same information, you had better have lots of extra room on your platinum card!
What works best for me personally is to check in once and awhile and skim the new topics – or search for something specific as needed. If anything sounds interesting and is getting lots of comments, that’s my cue to dive in. There might be some great new info or insights to be mined in there but if you want to post you need to pay a subscription fee.
Google’s Official AdSense Help Forum
We don’t mean to slight the gang from the Google AdSense team by putting them in here as our second suggestion. But the we like the official AdSense help forum too. We think this forum has one big advantage:
As the official forum, it’s going to be the primary destination for many AdSense publishers to ask questions. That keeps the forum active with a steady flow of user postings.
So chances are that many of your AdSense questions are being asked in this forum. Top contributors provide fast responses with concise answers. Oftentimes, the best answers are those that simply link directly to other good info. The links are coming from people who know their stuff. That being said, the reason it only gets second billing is that the official Google AdSense Help Forum is pretty much the destination of choice for all AdSense publishers, large and small. So be ready for a lot of “Why haven’t I received payment yet?” or “Why did you shut down my AdSense account?”
WarriorForum.com – AdSense Tagged
WarriorForum is another one of the most active webmaster forums. Though they don’t dedicate a specific subforum just to AdSense, they have multiple categories focused on ad networks and related topics. So I like to check in by viewing the list of new topics that are tagged with the Adsense keyword.
The key with WF – like most forums – is to quickly skim the topics. It’s not like a blog where topics are typically planned and well thought out. Forums are going to have lots of questions. You’ll need to pick and choose what you go through.
Tip: A Google Custom Search Strategy
That’s three great forums that cover AdSense. One of the things you’ll notice is that the majority of forums out there do not dedicate themselves entirely to AdSense. For the excellent, but still less active forums, their AdSense categories may not get as much daily traffic.
So now we have a strategy that can help you find information on AdSense quickly using your hand selected forums. And hopefully they include the ones we shared with you above.
Most of you use advanced Google search operators. If we wanted to use Google to search Webmaster World for something specific about AdSense, we could do the following:
site:webmasterworld.com inurl:/google_adsense { your search keywords }
Of course you replace { your search keywords } with… well… whatever your search keywords are! 🙂
That is great for a single forum. But if you had 10 different forums, blogs, or websites you wanted to search – you would have to repeat each for each one.
Google Custom Search is a good solution. It will give you a shortcut you can use to do one search only. What that means is that It’ll search all of your favorite AdSense forums, without returning content from the rest of the Web.
Here are the steps to get it set up.
First things first: have a list ready of all the AdSense related forums that you want to include in your custom search. Some of the best webmaster forums make great options.
Step 1 – Add a New Custom Search Engine
Go to https://cse.google.ca/cse/all and click Add.
Step 2 – Add Your List of Forums (by URL) to the Custom Search
It can be forums, blogs, or any website. But only include the ones you want included in your custom AdSense search. Make sure to give it a name. We used “AdSense Forums” as our custom search name.
Note: Notice the use of the wild card (*) symbol? That helps you include all topics or pages on the site… the ones that are within a particular section of the site… in your search.
Step 3 – Create and Copy Your Custom Search URL
Once you click Create, you’re done. Your custom search is available to use.
Step 4 – Start Searching
Just go to the public URL and start searching for your AdSense related topics. The results can only contain results from the sites you specified. Here we’re ready to search for topics related to “ad placement”.
Note: The results can now only be from the sites we included in Step 2. That’s the super cool part of using Google Custom Search as a research tool!
Some Powerful Google AdSense Research
Congrats to you for when you get this setup. We’ve shared our fav three AdSense forums. But, more importantly, for those of you that were unfamiliar with Google Custom Search, you now have a powerful new research tool.
Experiment with adding new forums and blogs to your custom search engine. It can definitely help you track down information from sites you trust. The alternative is googling from the entire Web. You’ll have a lot more pages (as in like millions) to filter through if you just do a regular search.
So try out this custom search strategy and let us know if you find it helpful in tracking down the specific AdSense info you need – and maybe just a little bit quicker!
What are your favorite forums for research Google AdSense and ad monetization strategy?
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