Blue is Best
Is it?

Here is a great tip that gurus often tell AdSense publishers, make your ad links blue. That however is only half of the story...

Yes blue is best for most website designs. Unless you have dark backgrounds, or the color-scheme of your website just begs for a different color. The whole point is to blend in the ads.

But the reason blue works so well is because people are used to links being blue. And after all is said and done, your AdSense ads are nothing but a bunch of links.

Here comes the kicker though, different shades of blue work better than others. Here is where your website scheme will dictate the shade of blue that will have the highest CTR (click-through rate). In general though, darker shades of blue (navy blue for example) tend to be clicked more often.

Okay so let’s say you’re completely lost. Dark, light, or normal blue? If you really can’t decide, try using all three.

Google AdSense units can be configured to use a random color palette. If you go to the ad settings, and check under the Color section, there should be a drop-down menu of the color palettes your have (or the default ones if you haven’t added any).

At the very bottom of the drop-down list there is an option that says “Use multiple palettes…”. Click that bad boy and you will notice now you can select more than one palette. Hold down the Ctrl key and select palettes that you created ahead of time for different shades of blue for the links.

Here is a bonus advantage to using multiple color schemes on your AdSense units. (By the way, feel free to use all kinds of colors if it suits your website). Changing colors is an effective tool against ad-blindness. Especially for returning visitors, an ad that is always the same exact tone of color is easily forgotten, but a subtle change catches the eye and makes users take a closer look...

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