Ten Most Expensive Domain Names Ever Sold

The sale and purchase of domain names have been a lucrative trade ever since the dot com bubble. Ordinarily, you can get a .com domain from GoDaddy for just $10. But there are people who rake in bucks by buying and then selling big, valuable domain names. Here are a list of the top 10 most expensive domain names ever sold. Only those domain names are listed which were sold purely as domain names i.e. only the domain name was part of the deal, and not the website itself.

It is worth noticing that all of these domains are .com domains, which goes on to say that they're the most valuable. These domain names are single-worded and are heavily searched by internet users, and get tonnes of direct traffic. So there you are, you just got yourself a tip: Always try to buy a single-worded domain, if you ever so chose to go into the domain trading business :)

1. insure.com - $16 Million

Insure.com was purchased by QuinStreet, an online marketing services and technology company. It is the single largest domain name ever sold. It was originally acquired by Insure.com for $1.6 million in December 2001. The website now provides life, car, and health insurance quotes among others.

2. fund.com - $14.9

fund.com is owned by “Gentile, Philip “. Gentile, Philip bought this domain for £9.9 million in March 2008, which amounted to about $14.9 Million. However, this domain is not yet live.

3. fb.com - $8.5 Million

This domain was purchased by Facebook, Inc. in September 2010 for $8.5 million. Currently, this domain redirects to Facebook.com. Facebook purchased this domain from American Farm Bureau Federation.

4. business.com - $7.5 Million

It is a business search engine and web directory founded in 1999 by Jake Winebaum, former chairman of the Walt Disney Internet Group. In July 2007 business.com, the company was sold to Yellow Pages publisher RH Donnelly for $345 million.

5. diamond.com - $7.5 Million

Although priced the same as business.com, this domain was purchased more than 7 years later in 2006, hence making it a slightly lower-value purchase (due to the depreciation of the dollar over time). It was bought by online jewelry retailer ice.com and is quite simply an online diamond jewelry store.

6. beer.com - $7 Million

Beer.com was purchased by Thought Convergence, LLC in Jan 2004 for” $7 million”. This domain is also currently not in use for any purpose.

7. Israel.com - $5.88 Million

Billed as "your first and best source for information about Israel". It was bought in 1994 by Joel Noel Friedman, a 46-year-old Jewish American. Rather than seek profit, he originally bought the site in fear that it would be misused by somebody else.

8. casino.com - $5.5 Million

casino.com was purchased by Mansion Limited of Gibraltar in November 2003 for $5.5 million. As the name suggests, this website hosts several online gambling games.

9. slots.com - $5.5 Million

slots.com was purchased by ”Bodog Media” in June 2010 for “$5.5 million”. This website also hosts several online gambling and slot games.

10. toys.com - $5.1 Million

Purchased in March 2009 for $5.1 Million by ToysRUs, a leading toy and video game company. Surely, this domain’s price is nothing as compared to the revenue that is being generated from it.

Step by step instructions to make your YouTube Channel a Money-Spinner

YouTube, the world's most prominent online zone for feature diversion, staring at TV shows, motion pictures Furthermore other diversion and educative features, has now turned into a fundamental characteristic for versatile Telephones as well. We watch transfers & offer features on Youtube. At the same time, the greater part of us doesn't understand that the YouTube channel can fill in as a cash spinner for us. The site you utilized only for amusement can now be transformed into a genuine business in the event that you know how to make that function.

Tips to Make Money from YouTube channel 

Set up a YouTube channel

When you watch features on YouTube, it doesn't request a sign-in and gives you a chance to watch the features. At the same time to make a channel with an income making adage, you must have a YouTube record you could call your own (you can sign in with your Google account on the off chance that you as of now have one or you can make one by topping off a basic structure).

Transfer features & have a high number of endorsers

Verify that you transfer top-notch features with a great substance which draws in the crowd. It will help you get a high number of viewers and endorsers. You may pick your informal communication locales like Facebook, Twitter, and so forth. to get individuals to watch your features.

Instructions to Show YouTube Activity Feed On Your Blogger

1.     Log in to blogger  Design > Page Element.

2. Click Add Gadget and select 'HTML/Javascript

3. Now Paste the Below code.

34.                        After pasting the above code

* Replace YouTube Username with your youtube username.

4. Now save your HTML/Javascript.

    You are done...

Create an example for transferring features

In the event that you are anticipating profiting then it’s of no utilization in the event that you transfer features simply once in a month. You need to create an example for transferring features frequently furthermore to catch up with the features you've effectively transferred. You can do it by answering remarks, likes, abhorrence’s, et cetera. Hold your supporters utilizing innovative courses and by including more associations. You can likewise remark on others' features and get them to visit your channel. Thusly, you won't just expand the number of viewers and endorsers additionally you will have the capacity to manufacture an association with your supporters, which is fundamental to build your wage from YouTube.

Don't imagine it any other way about copyrights

Don't play with the copyrighted substance unless you truly have a communicated authorization to transfer or utilization them. Infringement of such genuine laws put you out of the diversion as well as wind up with a lawful suit.

Google Ad-sense

Make a record with Google Ad-sense which implies you will be paid a certain measure of cash focused around pay-every click for the promotion you have on your feature and sometimes for the perspectives, as well. Since it will oblige a connection either to your PayPal or ledger, your certified postage information & other data are important so that your pay can be credited to you without any trouble.

YouTube organization

On the off chance that you as of now have a Google Ad-sense account, 24 hrs. is the typical measure of time needed to set up your organization. The following are the fundamental criteria for association.

Making Money with your New Blog - Monetizing Basics

Most bloggers will start off their venture in the hopes of earning big from their blogs. And not without reason either. Multitudes of people are earning a decent sum online. You can too. Earning money from your blog while sitting at home is like a dream for most, and yet, is a reality for many as well. It isn't difficult, it just needs some dedication, and the right guidance. In this post, well talk about monetizing your blog to make money online.

Before you move on, do take a look at some of the basics of blogging that we've covered so far.

Part 1: How to create your first blog - what platform to choose?

Part 2: Replace your blogspot domain with a Dot com domain From Godaddy

Part 3: Choosing best web-hosting for Blogger blogs

Part 4: 5 most practiced Ways of building Active blog Readership

Part 5: Basic SEO Tips for a Newly Launched Blog - Beginners Guide

Part 6: Making Money with your New Blog - Monetizing Basics

Google AdSense

Google AdSense is perhaps the most widely known advertising network, so much so that a lot of people, especially new bloggers don't know of any others except Google AdSense. So quite naturally, it'll be the first thing they apply to. Agreeably, Google AdSense is a good starter for beginners, and every blogger should try it at one point or another. However, for earning real hard cash, you'll need to look into some other networks.

Google AdSense is mostly a CPC network. CPC stands for Cost Per Click, and means that you get a certain amount for every click you get on your ads. You can also employ CPM (Cost Per Impression) as an AdSense publisher. CPM gives you a certain amount on the completion of a set Impressions target (for example $0.1 for every 1000 Impressions or views on your ads).

Here are some articles that will help you get the most out of your Google AdSense ads.

• 6 Advanced AdSense Optimization tips for increased ad revenue
• Complete list of Google AdSense fatures
• Top tips for optimizing Google AdSense ads
• Protecting against bad click activity

BuySellAds

Google AdSense is good in as far as 'getting-the-wheel-turning' is concerned. But these days, almost every other website is getting approved by Google AdSense, which has driven the ad-space and  competition up, and the cost down. That's why you get so little revenue per click.

This is where BuySellAds comes in. BSA does not operate like Google AdSense. Instead, they are Direct Ads. There's a marketplace where you get listed once you pass the BSA criterion of having over 60,000 unique pageviews per month. Advertisers can then pick you from the list, and choose you for hosting their ads based on your niche. This is one of the reasons why you should have a clearly defined niche, because it'll then be easier for sponsors for your niche to find your blog and advertise with it. Once you get picked, you get paid for putting up an ad for a certain period of time. Simple, yet effective. BSA is one of the biggest source of income for many intermediate to professional bloggers out there.

Read these articles to get a better idea about BuySellAds

• How to find sponsors for your blog?
• How to update public stats in BuySellAds
• The Pros and Cons of Direct Ads
• Style BSA empty Ad spots with CSS

Affiliate Ads

Affiliate Ads are yet another form of advertising, and they are based on compensations/commissions. The idea is, you promote a product or a service, get people to actually buy it, and then you get a certain sum as a reward for 'referring' that buyer.

This concept is pretty widely used now. Companies need to grow, and for that, they need customers. They'll do anything to get customers, which is why most online products and services, and even some offline companies too offer rewards for referrals. If you do it right, affiliate marketing can become your single largest source of income.

We here at MBT often share discount coupons from HostGator with our readers. HostGator in this case is acting as the host company, and will reward anyone who can bring in customers for it. If you visit their homepage, you will see how you can even earn $2000+ in one month just from referrals!

Here are some posts that ought to help you out with Affiliate Marketing

• Why is Affiliate marketing better than Google AdSense?
• 7 Important Affiliate marketing tips
• Are affiliate ads better than direct ads?

Got questions? Please feel free to ask in the comments section below. And please, try to keep it relevant. Thank you :)

Can You Really Make Money Blogging in 2014?

So, another year has passed, and we've entered a whole new, more promising one. We find ourselves yet again asking the question that we ask each year - can you still make money blogging in this year? A question that, no doubt, will prickle the interest of many a bloggers, especially new ones or those aspiring to become one. So, can you really make money blogging in 2014?

It seems like only yesterday that I last wrote on a topic like this, even though it's been almost an year now. So much has changed, yet so much has stayed the same. Even though the backbones of SEO remain the same, a lot of frontal details have changed. So is this year going to be any different for blogging? Let's take a look.

What's changed so far?

OK, before we mention anything else, let's talk about Hummingbird - the latest Google's search algorithm.

Hummingbird

While the Penguin and Panda updates in the last couple years were merely updates, this here is a big overhaul - a whole new algorithm. It's so big, that the major Caffeine update in 2010 doesn't come close. In fact, the last update of this scale was way back in 2001! So you can expect this one to be a major player, if not a game changer, yet.

The major emphasis now is on "conversational" search terms - queries which more closely resemble questions asked in real life. While this should not much effect bloggers who are currently publishing, it could, however, mean that beginners need to get more work done. Google is now trying to 'understand' queries, rather than just matching keywords. That increases the complexity of content that can be created - not a big problem for established bloggers, but definitely a mountain to climb for starters.

Keywords data

Google made the move to make all organic searches secure starting September 23rd last year. This means we've lost the ability to get keyword data for users arriving to our websites from Google search. This impacts publishers in many ways, including losing a valuable tool for understanding what the intent of customers that come to their site, for conversion optimization, and much more. This means that keyword data for tactical SEO is now harder to come by, and although there are work-arounds, they make it all very complicated.

This puts beginner bloggers at another disadvantage - the learning curve for them has been stepped up by quite a bit.

PageRank

PageRank might finally be going away. Google has stopped updating it regularly (last updated in December, almost 7 months late. They also won't update toolbar anytime soon. This might suggest that PageRank could be going away, since Google itself no longer puts much emphasis on it. So how does that effect blogging, you ask? It doesn't really. But it does mean that since PageRank is now updated after a long time, new blogs will have to wait a long time before they get a PageRank, and get out of the "zero" zone, which is a huge disadvantage. A major reason is given below.

Malpractices

Speaking of disadvantages, starters now run a greater risk of being targeted by plagiarism, spam, malicious activity, and other illegal activities. No one is born a pro. But times have become difficult now. There are too many people doing these activities at the expanse of others. For example, a lot of people copy and paste content from this blog (MyBloggerTricks) to their own. Now of course, MB has a reputable standing (thanks to our beloved readers like you), so this plagiarism does not really effect us.

But what about a blog that started a week ago? Even if they are creating their own, original content, they run the risk of getting penalized for plagiarism. Although Google's algorithms are smart, and they can detect plagiarism, they do sometimes miss their mark. In that case, it's the newbie's word against a pro. Take a guess who'll benefit.

Malicious activity is another problem. You have to be very protective of your security and privacy these days. You never know when someone might be stalking you, observing, waiting for a wrong move - not uncommon for a starter.

Tonnes of competition

Well, that's not surprising. We're already past the era of digitalization, and almost everybody has had their share of online experience to decide what they want to do henceforth. So everyone who wanted to create a blog, has gone ahead and done it. Of course saying "everyone" is a massive generalization, but not a very in-accurate one.

The competition is high - too high, and the payout is low - too low. It was difficult getting a fresh start in the world of blogging in 2013. It is even harder now. I'm not saying this to discourage beginners, but that's the reality of the world! If you are going to take a step forward, you should know what you're dealing with. And if you feel confident that you can work hard and overcome the odds, then we welcome you wholeheartedly! We need more brave people like you!

Is it worth it?

Speaking of competition, the advertisement rates today are much lower than they used to be. This means that starters have to look for other, possibly unconventional ways. Blogging, as we knew it a few years ago, has changed. 

You can no longer survive on hard work and luck alone. You need to lay down the entire groundwork. The concept, the idea, the design, the implementation, the maintenance. All of these things matter now. If you want to survive you need to have the full toolbox, and without a single component, you're a dead. To rise to equal footing with the others from the start, you need to offer something unique. Time is what it takes, and time is what you don't have.

So it it worth it, you ask? My immediate answer would be, no. However, you can turn it into a yes if you've got what it takes. Understand that you've got a long, tough uphill battle ahead of you. The rewards can be worth it if you set your goal to reach the top, and focus only on your goal. If you start thinking about the rewards, you'll get distracted, often frustrated, and you'll never get to the top.

So, what do you think? Are you considering picking this up as a career? We wish you the very best of luck, and we'll try to help you along your journey. Peace, and all the best :

Is Making Money From Blogging Haram?

So I was going through my inbox a few days back, and came across a very unusual question - the kind people don't usually worry about. A dear follower asked whether earning money online (through blogging etc.) was haram (prohibited is Islam) or not. The question has so many implications that we decided to make a blog post about it, since it not only applies to our Muslim fellows, but to our brethren in the whole blogging community, since it's a question of blogging ethics, and not just religion.

Note: For the record, let me just say that I do not claim to be a religious scholar. But having some domain knowledge, we'll try to discuss some issues majorly related to ethics and morality, and not very specific to a religion. Anyone can benefit from reading this post, as it applies to the blogging community as a whole.

OK, so moving on. A lot of people don't think twice about such issues, but apparently, some do. They are worried that their earnings might not be lawful for them from a religious point of view, since money made online can come from a lot of different sources, lawful or unlawful. 

The concept of 'haram' for Muslims refers to anything that is unlawful, and prohibited. This could anything from unlawful food to unlawful attire to unlawful deeds, and so on. Hence, anything that is unethical, immoral, or obtained through an illicit way is haram.

What can make blogging illicit?

We've talked a lot about blogging ethics before, but now would be a good time to round things up a bit. I'd like to make one thing clear though - there's nothing wrong or 'haram' about earning money online (e.g. via blogging). But it's how you do it that makes all the difference. Here are some examples.

Plagiarism and Copyrights violation

This practice is rampant throughout today's blogosphere. People often 'auto-blog' content from other blogs. They copy the entire contents of a page, and pass it as their own on their site. Some might copy content partially, but that's almost the same thing.

Note that quoting a source, and copying from a source are two entirely different things. The former gives credit to the original source, whereas the latter doesn't. An if you don't give credit to the person who deserve it, then you're actually stealing from them - stealing their money. Sure, the traffic you generate through that content, and the revenue that comes through it, that's for you. But did you deserve it? Violating copyright laws is theft, and stolen money is unlawful in all religions of the world.

Black Hat SEO

This is another thing that makes earning from blogging illicit. Black Hatters would argue that they're just using their hard-earned knowledge to find shortcuts. But that doesn't make it any less unethical. Black Hat SEO techniques exploit loopholes to rank up a webpage in Google Search results. Often, this is achieved by over-optimization, and will result in spammy and low quality content. This isn't fair to those who create good content, and play by the rules. It's like cutting in line at a long queue. The analogy might make it sound like a very petty crime, but when we're talking about large-scale traffic and revenue, the problem really scales up.

Publishing Scams

Laying digital traps, luring unsuspecting users, ensnaring them before they know what's going on; sounds like a great plot for a story. Except, it is the story of many blogs (and the many unfortunate stumblers who come across them) who try to scam their visitors into situations they don't want. Typical catalyst are promotions too good to be true, such as 'You're our 1000,000th visitor, click here for a free iPhone'! Although not a very subtle example, it serves to summarize the concept. Many users fall into traps like this when they're looking for a file to download, and get an application (executable) file instead. Many get hacked this way.

Tricking potential customers into doing business with you defeats the whole purpose of blogging. Would you set-up a shop in your neighbourhood and start cheating people out of money? People would make sure to avoid you the next time they come around. Blogging is not dissimilar. It is a lot about socializing, and making connections. And you'll never be able to build a reputation for yourself by publishing scam. Besides, stealing money from others, as we just discussed, is haram or unlawful.

Adult content

Pornography is prohibited in Islam, and is unethical in the society. If you have a site distributes, or deals with adult content in any way, you need to get rid of it! Any money made through adult content is unlawful, and should be avoided at all costs. This also includes the content id ads. The content itself on a site might not be objectionable, but a third-party ad-network might deliver adult content in advertisements. Even that is wrong. So make sure your advertiser isn't slipping in some adult pictures within their ads without you knowing.

Spam

Weird as it may sound, most of the comment spam found online is generated by bloggers (after bots, some of which are, again, set up by bloggers). Bloggers are always trying to create backlinks to their blogs, and bring in traffic. Blogging is a lot about making social connections. Without comments, that is almost impossible. While making comments on other sites is a good way to get traffic and create an online reputation, posting irrelevant comments for the sole purpose of generating traffic will kill your reputation.

Besides, leaving irrelevant comments just wastes other peoples' time. They account for illegal backlinks too. Even Google doesn't like such comments. So it is better to hold your comments off unless you have to something of value.

Your thoughts?

So, what do you think about these unethical practices? Do you think using them to earn money is licit? What more bad practices can you think of that are seriously unethical? Leave your interesting responses in the comments section below. We're eager to hear what you think :)

Are Advertisements The Only Way A Website Makes Money?

To most people, making money online is mostly about advertising on your blog or website. Advertisements can be of various form, including direct ads, affiliate ads, sponsored ads, and so on. While advertising remains one of the most popular and lucrative forms of online earning, it is not the only one. If you don't want to clutter up your website with all those ads, and prefer to keep things minimalistic, then you can consider other ways of making money with your website.

1. Sponsored Reviews

Paid reviews are a very common method of making money. Authoritative websites, or websites focused on a particular niche get paid to review certain website, app or web service. If you have a website with a decent traffic, you can contact a review network too and get paid for writing reviews on your website. Some of these networks include PayPerPost, ReviewMe, and BlogVertise etc.

2. Affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing is a form of advertisement, but not if you do it properly. Instead of just stamping an affiliate ad in your website's sidebar, it's far more important to actually create content about the product you're advocating. People write reviews, comparisons, rounds ups, and so on about the affiliate products they want to sell on their blog.

3. Consultancy and Special services

Offering your expert services in the form of consultation to clients who pay you is another form of making money online. MBT has its own services page, where you can get in touch and hire us for our professional services.

4. Software and Tools

If you're a developer, you can showcase the software and tools you've created on your website to make money. Some people offer free tools on their sites . You can offer trials, with option for users to buy the full versions of your software. These tools can be anything from Blogger widgets to WordPress plugins.

5. Themes and templates

There's another source of income you might have overlooked. If you're good at tweaking templates and themes, you can create your own and sell them. Bloggers are always looking for new themes or templates for their blogs, which is why some people, such as Brian Gardner from StudioPress, have made a fortune developing and selling templates.

6. Paid surveys and polls

There are services that will pay you money to run a small survey or poll on your website. The most popular one is called Vizu Answers. Basically you need to sign up with them, and select the kind of polls that you want to run your site. Most of these services operate under a CPM model.

7. eBook marketing

If you have sound knowledge of a particular subject, why not use it? You can build an eBook on it, and then sell it for a profit! Check out our post on building an eBook delivery system, complete with an auto-responder. Almost every pro-blogger has used this technique to make some money.

8. Donations

I hope things don't come to this, but if you're really doing some community work, or developing an open-source software, you can ask people for donations to fund your project. I wouldn't put it down as a profitable endeavour though. There are certain moral obligations associated with taking donations from the public - learn and understand them.

9. Selling websites and domains

Another very profitable business model is making and selling websites. Good domain names themselves go for 6+ figures. And developing websites can further add value. And if you have a well established blog or website, you can sell it for much more.

These are only some of the many ways you can earn money online without having o advertise on your website. Stay tuned for more ways to earn money online. If you have any questions, feel free to ask us in the comments section below. Peace :)

Best Advice For Making Money Online

So you want to make a name for yourself out there (and perhaps a buck)? Making money online today is no less of a phenomenon than it was a few years ago. The competition has grown, yes, and it's difficult to maintain a steady pace. But then again, so have the number of ways you can make money. However, to make your business successful, you have to step up your game. Here are some tips to help you make your business successful in 2014, and secure a better future for yourself.

1. Taking risks

People often tend to get intimidated by their competitors' numbers. Often, businesses try to inflate their statistics as a propaganda. So often times, they may be exaggerated. Studies show consumers are still being more careful with their money and not putting as much on credit. So not every business is doing great. There's no need to panic. If you or your product are worth the price you have listed, and you are not pricing yourself out of the market then stay put with your prices!

Also, now might be the time for some good investments. Do not be afraid to take risks, because what's business without risk, eh?

2. Show your public face!

Most business owners don't know, or care about it, but customers actually convert better when they know you're more than just a website on the internet - you're a human running a business! Many new start-up companies have started this tradition of having their CEO, or business owner, or some other person of note record a video message on their sites, talking about their business.

If you own your own business, make sure there's a video of you on your website talking confidently, and convincing people to deal with your business. Employee, and some user video testimonials won't hurt either. These things matter when it comes to your public relations, and people need to trust you personally before they will convert on your website. Get a jump-start!

3. Setting the right price

Don't always price yourself under the top competition's bargain deal. If you're the little guy, but offer a great product or service, ask for what you or your product is worth. In fact, when you price yourself with other top businesses you will have clients who will spend more when they understand the value of your business. They will recommend you to all their other friends who have healthier budgets too! If you know that you are worth more than you get now, then price yourself correctly and explain the value you give to your client or customer.

4. Social Media Marketing

Make a social media marketing plan. Are you using StumbleUpon, Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, LinkedIn, WordPress, Tumblr, Klout, SoundCloud, Google+, Youtube, Vimeo, Instagram, Pinterest, SnapChat, etc.? Choose wisely, and find where the client or customer you want to target is hanging out online or in the mobile world.

5. Invest in SEO

If you want to get discovered on search engines, now might be the time for investing in Search Engine Optimization. Start small and steady. Invest in an SEO (search engine optimization)/content writing guru and make sure you are findable in relevant searches. SEO has changed quite a bit in the last couple years. If you are in a competitive market it may take a little longer to build a strong online presence! It's worth its weight in gold to appear in relevant searches that reaches your exact demographic and market.

Many businesses and bloggers still don't realize the importance of videos. About 40% of them still don't have videos on their sites. Video has now become more important than ever. Find out what content laterals you have available to you, and exploit them to the best of your advantage.

Another key to success in any business is patience. Most business plans fails owing to the lack of it. Business owners often jump the gun so to speak, and don't have a proper timeline so they can analyze their marketing and advertising efforts. Patience can do a lot for your business. If you apply it, and then apply apply yourself in your business by utilizing some of these tips, you can gain new heights in this era of a recovering economy. Make hay while the sun shines! Cheers :)

AdSense Publisher Scorecard: Best Tips & Practices

After an interesting Hangout with AdSense Folks on 18th June at Google+, Susan Wojcicki announced about an interesting new feature called Publisher Scorecard that has been added to all AdSense accounts and the scorecard summary chart can be seen under the Home Tab. Scorecard is a tool that gives greater insights to Publishers to compare how well their Ad settings, Website load time and content is performing compared to other Publishers using AdSense as the contextual Ad network. It displays a summary of three important categories which includes Revenue Optimization, Site Health and Google+ button Integration. Each category is scored on a scale of 1-5 blue dots that indicate your performance rank or level. In today's tutorial we will learn every basic detail of this great scoring tool and will learn how to optimize our websites and blogs to increase the overall AdSense earning. Lets jump straight to this fun ride and make better money with AdSense!

What are the Scorecard Categories?

Above is a screenshot of my AdSense Account. You can clearly see the three important bolded categories which are further divided into sub categories:

1. Revenue Optimization:

By Revenue Optimization we mean improving anything that increases your overall Page CTR and RPM value and boost your earning. We received two 2/5 blue dots here and a yellow icon that indicates that this section needs improvement. It can be optimized by making three major improvements and that are:

(a) Using Recommended Ad formats

These recommended formats are often 336x280, 300x250, 728x90 or 160x600. If you are running any Ad formats other than these then please upgrade them immediately.

How to Improve it?

To improve this section use recommended ad formats that I mentioned above and you must keep your Ads above the fold. I would suggest to keep a 336X280 Text/Image Ad just below Blog Post tiles and a 728x90 big banner just below your blog header. Add a 160X600 skyscraper to your Sidebar.

Please make sure to keep your web design such that these ads may appear above the fold. The visitor must see the ads when your site loads without having to scroll down. Use the following App by Google to test if your ads are above the fold or not:

• Above the Fold Testing tool

We recently developed a Plugin called AdSense Booster to add AdSense ads just above the excerpt/read more tag. This plugin was developed for blogger blogs. But you can get the same functionality even in wordpress by installing Quick AdSense Plugin.  I must tell you that our earnings increased by 40% after we installed this simple plugin which is now available to even blogger users and we are using the same plugin to  show a 468 X 60 Ad just below the opening paragraph. You can see it live in this post just below the first paragraph.

(b) Enabling both Text and Image Ads on this formats.

I would suggest that you must enable this if you haven't already done. AdSense bot knows best when to display Text or Media Ad based on the content on your site. If you are choosing just text ads or image ads then you are loosing the opportunity of an optimized Click through Rate.

How to Improve it?

Go To My Ads Tab inside your AdSense account and then click the "Edit ad Type" link below your Content Ad units. Choose the option Text & image/rich media ads as shown below:

Do this for all your AdSense for content Ad zones.
(c) Reduce Crawler Errors

This is one major section which people often underestimate and this returns in low earning. I always strongly recommend our clients to do a through validation of both their site HTML structure and robots.txt file. You must let the AdSense bot to crawl and scan your content the easiest way possible and don't block its way with Messy Fancy Scripts.

If you check our scorecard we received a green Tick which shows an  Excellent Score. To reduce crawler errors first make sure all Jquery scripts that you use are placed within the <head> and </head> tags. Clean up your site HTML structure and remove  any script that is increasing your site speed and causing the browser to crash.

Google has a list of crawlers for different tasks such as for detecting images, videos, smart phones or AdSense Ads. In order to make sure you allow AdSense Googlebot to crawl your site you must give it rights to do so by adding the following line in your robots.txt file:

User-agent: Mediapartners-Google
Disallow: 

See our robots.txt file as an example.
Note: Blogger users have this added by default. Wordpress users may manually add this.

2.  Site Health

Here as usual Google expects you to improve your Page speed Performance. Matt Cutts did announce on April 2010  that Page Load time would be a deciding factor for websites to rank higher on SERPs. They went so far that they even introduced PageSpeed tools last year which helps you to reduce load time of your webpages. An interesting and complete tutorial is linked below:

• Google PageSpeed Tools
• Must Read: 14 Disadvantages of Slow Loading Blogs

Yes we score too bad here as we received a red alert. Which of course is justified because I love the blog to look professional and stand apart. Here we have never listened to Google because we tried our level best to reduce the load time but Google never seemed like getting satisfied! :p I guess we would need to remove some further widgets and images to cut down the Page Load time.

How to Improve it?
Here are some quick and proper ways to reduce load time:

• Use CSS3 features to  create backgrounds, gradients, drop shadows and don't use Images. Create elements using CSS3 as much as you can.
• Use small image patterns for backgrounds and scroll them vertically or horizontally instead of using large and big images
• Use CSS Sprites to reduce http requests. You will find severa
• Place all Javascript in one place and one file
• Place all stylesheets in one linked file
• Remove useless Plugins and Widgets
• Never compress CSS nor JavaScript! Even I used to recommend this before but when we talk of site maintenance you will get confused figuring out the compressed code. So please never make a mess out of your code. Keep it well indented and structured.

3. Integrate Google+ Button on your sites

Well how can Google forget promoting their Social network. So yes you must make sure to add Google+ buttons on your site to ensure you get maximum number of +1 recommendations because believe it or not social sharing votes does count a lot.

How to Improve it?

Simply add a GooglePlus button inside your posts and your sidebar. Also create a Google+ Fan Page. Read the following delicious tutorial to get things going.

• Add Google+ Button to your site
• Create a Google+ Fan Page
• Create Google+ Business Page  - Optional

Scorecard Symbols and Indicators

Following are some interesting details about the various symbols used in your scorecard chart. You can find more help and details on scorecard at Google Groups

1. Following are the three important Scores symbols and their description

Score	Description
	Excellent! No need to make any changes to this category.
	Improvements suggested. You are advised to make some further improvements to this item.
	Needs improvement! You must or may take quick action to optimize this item

2. Following are some symbols that would appear after you make the suggested changes.

Symbol	Meaning
	This category’s score has increased by one or more blue dots up to four blue dots.
	This category’s score has drop down by one or more blue dots down to three blue dots.
	This item’s score has gone up from “Needs improvement” to “Improvements suggested”.
	This item’s score has gone down from “Improvements suggested” to “Needs improvement”.

Need Help?

I guess we covered every single tip and almost all best practices used to make sure you monetize your sites well and improve your CTR and RPM value. If there is anything we emphasize a lot to our clients after SEO then it's the site Design and then Monetization. Please give extra care to how appealing your site design is. You have the right to make it eye-catching by using all Fancy Jquery effects but please be assured that sometimes you need to sacrifice for the sake of a bigger gain. This is one reason why Wikipedia is so ugly yet so powerful.

It's time for some home work, we will do ours, you do yours!. Let me know for any help needed. Peace and blessings buddies. :)