14 DAY TRIAL // Google is one of the most open companies out there but at the end of the day it wants to make money just like everyone else so the advertising programs, which generate the overwhelming majority of the search giant's revenue, have been mostly kept close to the chest, with advertisers and users presented with a pretty much “take it or leave it” option. But now, either because of the slowing growth in revenue or because it feels comfortable enough with its lead, Google is opening up its AdSense program to third-party ad vendors.
“We've been hearing your requests for new ways to generate revenue in AdSense, and new ways to maintain control over the ads that appear on your sites. With that in mind, we're pleased to announce plans to give you the ability to allow multiple Google-certified ad networks to compete for display ad space on your site,” Sean Harvey, business product manager, wrote.
At the moment web site owners who use AdSense get the ads from advertisers using AdWords to bid by means of an automated system for certain keywords. The winning ad from the number of competing ones going for the same keywords gets served on the site. With the new system though, ads coming from third-party ad networks will be allowed to bid and potentially get displayed on the sites instead of the ones coming from AdWords. AdSense users will be able to control what ad networks can bid for their sites and can block the ones they don't want or even all third-party ones if they choose to.
Of course, Google won't let just any ad network use its program and those interested will have to meet some pretty strict standards regarding user privacy, the ad's quality and the speed at which the network can serve them. And it gets even harder for networks that use similar tools to Google's to serve “interest-based” ads as these will only be allowed to use AdSense as long as they don't collect any data from the web sites. The program will be slowly rolled out over the next months.