Risking AdSense with Click-and-Miss

The Inside Adsense blog reminds us about implementing ad placements that could inflate the incidence of click and miss.

They suggest three possible scenarios:

In close proximity to Macromedia Flash games

Under pop-ups or download prompts

Near site navigation controls on your pages, such as drop-downs or menu links

The last bullet might cause some alarm so most AdSense Publishers as this seem to be a common practice in ad layouts. I earlier blogged about “Adsense over-optimization could lead to click fraud?” and this could be related to that incident.

I think the rule of thumb here is that if the ads are placed in a position that it could be likely clicked due to slight inaccuracies in mouse movements then it’s possible to get your account banned for it. Hat tip to Chino.