Tag Archives: AdSense

Changes to DFP Reporting, now with more deprecation!

After our last round of spring cleaning, we've gone back to the drawing board to take another look at how we could make reporting better. There currently is an abundance of Dimensions, DimensionAttributes, and Columns (and more coming with each release), so in an effort to simplify the list of fields, we will be sunsetting the following reconciliation-related dimension attributes / columns in all versions. This will happen on September 1, 2015.

Columns with equivalent replacements:

Columns without equivalent replacements:

While the first two have equivalent replacements, the latter ones are not being replaced, as they don’t exist in core product reporting either.

This means that usage of these columns / dimension attributes will begin throwing errors in all versions starting September 1st. If your network is actively using any of these, please update your reports to switch to the supported fields or remove them entirely. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about this, you know where to reach us!

 - , DFP API Team

Help me help you (improve the DFP API)

Believe it or not, the DFP API Team eat, breathe, and live the DFP API. We wake up in the morning thinking, "How can I make the DFP API even better?" Seriously, I have had dreams about the API. It’s weird, but I’m not embarrassed to admit that.

In an effort to delight our developers even more, we’re turning the proverbial mic over to you - our customers - to help us help you. Here’s your chance to let us know how we could be better – better support, better features in the client libraries, better content in workshops, better examples, better haircuts... really, anything. Simply fill out our survey with your thoughts here.

 - , DFP API Team

What’s new with IMA iOS SDK Beta 15?

Last week, we released beta version 15 of the IMA SDK for iOS. This release includes two new features:

  • Ad buffer events via IMAAdsManager delegates
  • Debugging mode

Ad buffer events

We’re providing more information on ad buffering by introducing new buffering events via the following optional IMAAdsManagerDelegate methods:

  • adsManagerAdPlaybackReady:
  • adsManagerAdDidStartBuffering:
  • adsManager:adDidBufferToMediaTime:

Collectively, these delegate methods provide more transparency into buffer events, giving you more control over the user’s ad experience. For more detailed information on these new methods, take a look at the reference documentation.

Debugging mode

We’ve introduced a new debugging mode setting to allow for more verbose logging to the console. You can now set IMASettings.enableDebugMode to YES to enable debug mode. This should not be used in production, as it will show a watermark on the ad player.

A note about CocoaPods

If you’re using CocoaPods with the IMA SDK, please make sure to use at least version 0.38.

As always, if you have any questions, feel free to contact us via the support forum.

 - , IMA SDK Team

Relaxing constraints on ad group name uniqueness

Have you ever found it frustrating that you can never reuse an AdGroup name after removing the AdGroup, since a removed AdGroup cannot be modified? We have awesome news for you!

Now, AdGroupService doesn’t consider REMOVED AdGroup names when verifying that an AdGroup name is unique within a Campaign. If an AdGroup is in a REMOVED state, then the name of that AdGroup can be reused. This is already the case for Campaigns, and we’ve extended this relaxation of constraints to AdGroups.

If you have questions or need clarification, visit us on the AdWords API Forum or our Google+ page.

Nadine Sundquist, AdWords API Team

Introducing a new user consent policy

Today we’re launching a new user consent policy. This policy requires publishers with site visitors from the European Union to ask their permission for using their data.

Why are we doing this?

European Union data protection authorities requested some changes to current practices for obtaining end user consents. It has always been Google’s policy to comply with privacy laws, so we’ve agreed to make certain changes affecting our own products and partners using Google products.

What do you need to do?

If your websites are getting visitors from any of the countries in the European Union, you must comply with the EU user consent policy. We recommend you start working on a policy-compliant user consent mechanism today. There’s guidance from data protection authorities and IABs across Europe on what is required to comply with relevant laws; the IAB's IAB Europe Guidance: Five Practical Steps to help companies comply with the E-Privacy Directive is a good place to start.

To learn how to implement a user consent mechanism, check out our help center FAQs and visit Cookie Choices, a website dedicated to complying with this new policy.

Posted by Jason Woloz, Security & Privacy Program Manager, Display and Video Ads

Source: Inside AdSense


New guide for setting up AdWords API authorization using the OAuth 2.0 Playground

For those of you who’d prefer to generate an OAuth refresh token using only a browser, there's a new guide on how to use the OAuth 2.0 Playground:

https://developers.google.com/adwords/api/docs/guides/oauth_playground

The guide walks you through the authorization setup required by the AdWords API for a Web application--via a browser session--without the need to execute any command-line scripts.

More OAuth resources
Still have questions? Feel free to visit us on the AdWords API Forum or our Google+ page.

- Josh Radcliff, AdWords API Team

Demystifying AdSense policies with John Brown: Understand your traffic (Part 3)

Editor’s note: John Brown, the Head of Publisher Policy Communications, is sharing insights about understanding your traffic and how you can prevent invalid activity.

Last week, I explained why we take invalid activity seriously and how AdSense policies protect users, advertisers and publishers. This week, I’d like to give you some tips to help you keep your account in good standing.

What can you do as a publisher?

Here are some best practices to prevent invalid activity on your site:

  • Monitor your analytics often to spot traffic anomalies. Setting up Analytics alerts can be very useful. For instance, you can set Analytics alerts to see if an unusual amount of traffic comes from a country you wouldn’t expect for your site.
  • Be very careful when purchasing any traffic, and review the traffic provider checklist to help guide your discussions with any traffic provider you’re considering.
  • Double and triple-check your implementation. Make sure your implementation has no programming errors, conforms to AdSense policies, and interacts properly across different browsers and platforms. Having a well-implemented page can protect against unintended consequences, like accidental clicks. 
  • Don’t click on your own ads. Even if you’re interested in an ad or looking for its destination URL, clicking on your own ads is prohibited. Instead, use the Google Publisher Toolbar.

You can find more information about ad traffic quality and best practices on our Ad Traffic Quality Resource Center. I hope these resources help clarify why we care about the quality of the ecosystem and what you can do to comply with our traffic policies. Please share your feedback and do let us know if you have additional questions in the comment section below this post.

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Posted by John Brown
Head of Publisher Policy Communications

Source: Inside AdSense


FeedMappings for location targeting available via the AdWords API

What's changing?
Starting on or after July 23, 2015, if you are using v201506 of the AdWords API, then FeedMappingService.get and FeedMappingService.query will return FeedMapping objects created for location targeting. These FeedMapping objects will have criterionType 77, and will not have a value for placeholderType. There will be no change in behavior for v201409 or v201502.

You will start seeing these objects if either of the following is true:
  • You created a Feed linked to your Google My Business account.
  • You created a Location targeting feed through the AdWords user interface, under Shared library -> Business data.
Why the change?
Starting with v201506, LocationGroups.feedId is required if your matching function includes a LocationExtensionOperand.

Specifying a feedId in this situation allows AdWords to target the areas surrounding the locations in a location targeting feed. This may be the same feed you are using for location extensions, or a separate feed containing additional locations you want to use strictly for targeting. The key point is that the Feed referenced by LocationGroups.feedId must have a FeedMapping with criterionType 77.

What should you do?
If your application retrieves FeedMapping objects, make sure it will properly handle objects where placeholderType is null and criterionType is set.

If you want to create LocationGroups objects that use a LocationExtensionOperand, you can now use FeedMappingService to find the ID of feeds that have a FeedMapping with criterionType 77.

Learn more
Check out the following resources for more information on Location Groups: Still have questions? Feel free to visit us on the AdWords API Forum or our Google+ page.
- Josh Radcliff, AdWords API Team

DFA API sunset reminder

As we announced in December 2014, with the release of the DCM/DFA Reporting and Trafficking API, we will be sunsetting the legacy DFA API on September 30th, 2015. To avoid an interruption in service, all DFA API users are required to update their application to use our new API by this date. If you haven’t yet started migrating, we strongly encourage you to do so.

If you’re new to the DCM/DFA Reporting and Trafficking API, you can use our Get Started guide to get up and running quickly. You can also reference our Migration Guide to help in transitioning legacy DFA API applications to the new API. If you have any other questions, feel free to reach out to us on the developer forum.

 - , DCM API Team

Demystifying AdSense policies with John Brown: Understand your traffic (Part 2)

Editor’s note: John Brown, the Head of Publisher Policy Communications, is sharing insights and answering most common questions about invalid activity.

In this post, I want to stress why we take invalid clicks so seriously and clarify a few questions related to traffic quality and invalid clicks.

Let’s take a step back and think about the digital ad ecosystem. The relationships between Google, advertisers, and publishers are built on trust. A strong and healthy digital ecosystem needs:
  • Users who trust the system and have a good experience,
  • Advertisers safely investing in digital ads,
  • Publishers who can sustain their business.
To protect those relationships, it’s very important to make sure that clicks and impressions are based on genuine user intent. That’s why at Google we have a global team that monitors the traffic across Google's ad network, and prevents advertisers from paying for invalid traffic.

Now, I'd like to address some of the most common questions and concerns from publishers related to ad traffic quality and invalid clicks.

  • What is Google's obligation to publishers?

Google manages advertiser relationships so that you don’t have to. Publishers benefit from our vast supply of ads. To provide ads to your sites for the months and years to come, advertisers must trust our network. Our policies are in place to protect these advertiser relationships, which ultimately protects publishers that work with us as well.

  • What happens to earnings held back from publishers due to invalid activity?

Any revenue found to be from invalid activity is refunded back to the active advertisers, not kept by Google. In 2014, we refunded more than $200,000,000 to advertisers from detected invalid activity. In 2014, we’ve disabled more than 160,000 sites to protect the ecosystem.

  • What can Google do to better communicate policies and enforcement?

We’ve adopted a policy of silence for the most part in order to protect our signals. We find it important to protect our signals so that bad actors cannot detect how we discover invalid activity. Additionally, we are always striving to increase transparency around our communications without compromising our techniques to protect advertisers and publishers. Stay tuned for new features which will help you have more control over your content and stay compliant with the policies.

  • Will Google modify interactions with the publisher community going forward?

We realize that we can improve our communications, especially around warnings, suspensions, and account disablement.  My charge is to do this. I have many people working with me on better education, along with improving the language and instructions around warnings or messages received from Google. I believe that publishers understand much better where they stand at all times when our policies are clear and when we communicate them effectively, and enforce consistently.

I hope you found these insights useful. Check back here next week where we’ll talk about what you can do as a publisher to help us protect the digital ecosystem. Let us know what you think in the comments section below.

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Posted by John Brown
Head of Publisher Policy Communications


Source: Inside AdSense