Any one who has been using Google Adsense for a while knows, even though most of the time ads shown on your site are relevant to the page they are being shown at, some time they can be way off from the intended theme of the page.

Even though we cannot choose which ads can be shown on our content network by Google. I feel it is our duty as webmasters to ensure ads being displayed on our content networks are relevant and add to the overall value of the site. After all if a person clicks on ad being displayed on your site, that leads him to a scam site and he gets scammed, he will associate that bad experience with your site. Even though you didn’t have any thing to do with it. Add to this, if people are continuously led to pages that display mainly ads and little content, it might cause people to form a perception in their mind, that clicking on ads is worthless! Which lets face it, isn’t good for genuine publishers and marketers like you and me.

So what can we do to prevent this from happening on our sites?

Thankfully, Google has provided us two tools that help us achieve these objectives. These are: Competitive ad filter and Google Adsense preview tool.

Competitive ad filter: Even though the name suggests it is mainly for blocking competitor’s ads from appearing on your content network, it can also be used to block unwanted and MFA advertisements.

Google Adsense preview tool: Google Adsense preview tool is essential to find out which ads you want to block from your site. You can preview ads that would show on a particular page even before you add adsense to it! Due to this it serves multiple interests and is an essential tool for any one running adsense on their blog/sites.

Blocking unwanted ads: Lets get down to the business, this step by step guide will tell you how to block those nasty ads from appearing on your site.

1. Install Adsense Preview tool: This is the first step you have to follow, click here to download adsense preview tool. Once you have downloaded the registry file, double click on it and click yes in the confirmation window. At this moment it is only compatible with Internet Explorer 6 and above for windows, in case you use Mozila Firefox you can download this extension.

2. Preview ads: Go to the target page and right click and choose Google Adsense Preview Tool. You will be presented with a window in which list of ads will be shown based on your country, however you can change that by clicking on Choose Options and then choosing the ad format and country for which you want to view the ads.

Note: clicking on ads shown in the preview window or displaying them again and again, does not count toward impressions or clicks.

3. Select unwanted ads: After this you need to select the ads you want to block from appearing on your site, by clicking the checkbox above them.

After you have selected all the ads you don’t want to see, click on show target URLs and you will be presented with a list of urls for those ads. Simply copy these and move to step 4.

4. Add sites to Competitive ad filter: Now login to your adsense account and click on adsense setup and then click on Competitive ad filter.

In this dialog box, paste the list of urls and edit them to suit your need.

Remember you can only enter a maximum of 200 urls each for adsense for content and adsense for search. Once you have followed the steps above, it can take any where from an hour to a day or two for those ads to stop appearing on your site.