matchmaking ads?

This morning instead of the usual Google ads on the sidebar, I was greeted by a full length ad for match.com inviting me to search for a male/female match.

Anyone else seeing the same thing? A couple of my members are not happy at all! When I refreshed, we were back to the usual Google ads. Is this normal or is someone messing around?

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Permalink Reply by Kate Lennon on November 18, 2009 at 12:23am

Google (AdSense) now uses ads from several other companies.
But - what's wrong with matchmaker ads?

Permalink Reply by Owen Calverley on November 18, 2009 at 12:48am

Depends on what they contain and how they are slanted. Not all NING networks are aimed at broad-minded people looking for company.

Permalink Reply by Kate Lennon on November 18, 2009 at 1:06am

Then why not upgrade and pay to run your own Google ads? Then you'd be able to filter them and, for example, block image ads from being displayed on your site.

Permalink Reply by Kate Lennon on November 18, 2009 at 1:36am

Google Ads are very intelligently targeted, so obviously there is some text on Owen's website that is being interpreted as having to do with singles, dating or whatever. All he has to do is locate that text - in his keywords or wherever - and change it. There is a useful tool at:

http://www.xml-sitemaps.com/se-bot-simulator.html

which allows you to see your page as the search engine robots see it.
If Owen runs the URL of his network through this, he should be able to spot the text that is causing the Googlebots to misidentify his site as dating-related.

Permalink Reply by Owen Calverley on November 18, 2009 at 1:49am

Thanks Kate! I will do that. Interestingly enough I saw the same ad on three different networks that I administer - two of which are about mosaics! hmmm ... :)

Permalink Reply by Kate Lennon on November 18, 2009 at 4:08am

Well, all I can tell you is that I have Google Adsense ads running on my networks and I have never yet seen an ad that did not *precisely* reflect the content of the page it was on. In fact the accuracy is quite amazing. So I would say that there are definitely some repeated phrase or term on your pages - either in your keywords or the body of your text - that are open to a different interpretation. In fact I found several after just a cursory look at your sites. For example, the term: "for crafters to meet, chat, swap" is definitely going to be read as a reference to swinging, and possibly even to wiccan swinging. On your mosaic site you use the term "social network" in your own text. If I were you I would take that out. And I would also remove the word "passion" from your network title, because there is no doubt that this is going to be picked up as a dating-related keyword by the Googlebots.

Permalink Reply by Owen Calverley on November 18, 2009 at 5:01am

Kate you are a gem! Thank you so much for the time you spent on this. I will definitely do some editing. I learn new insights every day! I did follow your advice earlier, but never looked at those "innocent" terms from a bot's viewpoint.

Ta very much.

Permalink Reply by Owen Calverley on November 18, 2009 at 1:36am

SkySong sums it up very nicely, thank you. Yes some days the AdSense ads are actually relevant to the network, which is great. And then we get way out weird stuff which totally our members either ignore or get irate about. I have gone ad-free on one of my networks, but it's not always an option, especially when a network is young and still growing. SkySongs words "In the end, we lose and so do the advertisers and NING" are especially relevant.

Permalink Reply by xiola23 on November 20, 2009 at 7:37pm

So, I'm having the exact same problems and found a bit of help from this whole discussion but I'm still very confused as to how to fix, add, change or delete these words or phrases from my site that would cause match.com to pop up with their picture/graphics ads.
My site is a narcolepsy support group and my members are there to get just that; support. I've had a few people already mention to me how unhappy they are with these new ads popping up. For the most part they used to be ads pertaining to sleep and narcolepsy or dreams and were pretty helpful and relevant.
The site is mainly full of members on social secuirty disability (including myself) and cannot afford to pay for the premium service to do away with the ads all together.

Can someone explain a little more in detail how to fix this or atleast limit this more. I visited the google website concerning the google-bots but am spinning with confusion. Any and all help is GREATLY APPRECIATED. Thanks!

Permalink Reply by Kate Lennon on November 21, 2009 at 5:49pm

Xiola,

If you go to:

http://creators.ning.com/forum/topics/updating-the-ads-we-run-on

you'll see that Ning are now running ads other than Google Ads, and that these new ads "may not be as targeted as the Google Ads". In addition, as I mentioned above, Google is now using ads from other companies which comply with Google's standards.

My guess is that it will take a little time to fine-tune these new ad channels to the point where they are as accurately targeted as the original Google Ads.

I think the only thing you can do to reduce the possibility of inappropriate/non-relevant ads displaying on your site is to make sure that the text on your site that is accessible to the robots (you can check this at the site I linked above), and your key words, reflect as accurately as possible what your site is about. I would suggest that you only use two or thee key terms (eg, "narcolepsy", "sleep disorder", "neurological disorder"), and keep your page title (the words you use in your title carry more weight than anything else on your site) as brief and unambiguous as possible. Above all, be aware when you are writing articles that many words and phrases are open to misinterpretation by robots (eg, the term "meet, chat, swap" in the text on Owen's site). If you are careful, I would guess that at least 99% of the ads that appear on your site will be accurately targeted, and that's probably as good as it's going to get. But at least you're not going to have "heavy duty" adult ads displaying, as these will definitely be filtered out. I think the worst you're going to get, every now and then, are ads for dating/matchmaking websites.

If I were you I'd seriously consider paying for the privilege to run your own Google Ads on your site. Then you'd have far more control over the ads that appeared. If your site gets a reasonable amount of traffic, you could end up making a profit.

Permalink Reply by MAXX on November 21, 2009 at 6:41pm

i run a marriage reconciliation site and matchmaker ads are appearing.......they are definitely not appropriate for my site, and it's tough not to use keywords that would be relevant to matchmaker

Permalink Reply by Kate Lennon on November 21, 2009 at 7:07pm

Do you mean that it's a bit like advertising booze to a recovering alcoholic?

The best thing to do is pay Ning to stop running the ads and run your own ads instead. It doesn't cost much, and, as I said, you might even make a profit.
If you can't afford that, another possibility might be to charge your members a nominal fee - say $1 a month - to cover the cost of having the ads removed. You could collect this via PayPal recurring billing (or even by getting your members to call a premium telephone number).
Let's face it, if they're not prepared to invest $1 a month in saving their marriage, there can't be much hope of reconciliation anyway, can there?