It looks like the people at Adsense are trialing a new format of ads again. Actually its not completely new – the size is the normal wide skyscraper (160 x 600) but the difference is that they are trying 7 ads in it rather than the usual 5.
The font is smaller and there is no URL on the design. I found it on one of their tester sites, sitemeter which runs Adsense ads on their stats pages (like this one).
Adsense have tested numerous formats on these pages and only some of what I’ve seen trialed there has ever gotten through to the rest of us so don’t count on seeing it as an option too soon – but you never know.
I’ve included a screen shot of this skyscraper (left – click to enlarge) because these tests always last too long.
What do you think of the new format? Theoretically it should increase the click through rate for ads as there are more chances of ads being relevant for readers – however the font is smaller which decreases the chances of users seeing them.
The other initial thought I have is that most of my pages already have two ad sections per page and Google struggles to fill them both already as it is. I worry that if I moved to a 7 ad format whether the other ad section would more often than not be empty.
I guess we’ll find out how useful the format is by whether they offer it to us.
