Yes, Virginia, AdSense link units do work

Well, to team at Inside AdSense has confirmed what many of us long-time AdSense publishers already know: link units do make money. The trick, of course, is to use the right link unit format in the right position on the page.

Though they don't say it specifically in their posting, the example they show is very telling, because the example uses a horizontal link unit.

When link units were first introduced, they were only available in the vertical format. I tried them, but they didn't seem to make much money for me. The problem is that in many page layouts the vertical link units don't really fit in — they look out-of-place.

This changed, though, with the introduction of the horizontal format. Horizontal link units are very short, just high enough to show a single line of links. This makes them much easier to place on a page. Why? Because it's usually fairly simple to stick them above the fold to take advantage of the AdSense heat map. It's very easy, in fact, to place them near any existing navigational links already on the page, especially the “bread crumb” trails that many sites display. Take a look at my AdSense case study, The Invisible Fence Guide, for another example of horizontal link unit positioning.

And if you're concerned that placing the link units near navigational aids is a way of fooling visitors into clicking ads they don't want to click, remember that link units require two clicks to make you any money. After the initial click, the visitor can easily use the browser's back button to return to your site. It doesn't cost the advertisers anything or make you any money until they click a link on the Google-supplied links page.

So if you don't already have horizontal link units on your site, consider adding them. The payouts from some of the clicks can be quite good, and almost everyone who uses horizontal link units reports an increase in earnings.

Eric Giguere is the AdSense expert who wrote Make Easy Money with Google. Subscribe to his AdSense newsletter for more tips and advice on AdSense and content monetization.

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