Impression issues often relate to how ads are displayed and their position on your page. Here's how to verify that a decline in impressions is the cause of the earnings drop:
The example above shows earnings declining along with impressions while page views and coverage are stable. (Note, if you’re filtering by breakdowns, you can use ad requests instead of page views.)
Possible reasons for a decline in impressions:
Implementation issues
If you're not implementing ads correctly, ads will not show on your site, which means impressions won't be counted.
How to check
- Check on your site directly to see if ads are showing.
How to fix
- Review the common issues with ad code implementation and fix any issues.
- Use Chrome DevTools to troubleshoot issues with your ads not showing.
- Run a report to find which page, device, ad formats or ad units are causing the drop and fix the issue.
Ad placement and ad formats
Impressions can fluctuate depending on the ad placement and the ad formats you use. Some placements and ad formats perform better than the others.
How to check
- Create a report, and select the Active View Viewable metric.
- Check if you've changed your ad placement or ad formats recently.
How to fix
- Learn more about viewability. Run a report to see which ad formats and ad units generally have higher viewability by adding the Ad format or Ad unit breakdown. Based on the findings, consider placing your ads where they have a greater opportunity to be viewed.
- Learn the best practices for ad placement and how you can optimize ad placements and site design.
Invalid traffic
Impression count can fluctuate due to invalid traffic. Additionally, if we observe high levels of invalid traffic on your account, we may suspend or close the account to protect our advertisers and users.
How to check
- If you have none of the issues above, and you see a steep drop in performance.
- You can also check your finalized earnings to find the adjustments made for invalid impressions or clicks.
How to fix
- Monitor your ad traffic to ensure that your account is compliant with our Program policies and not accruing invalid traffic.
- Review this article on how you can help to prevent invalid traffic, and visit our Ad Traffic Quality Resource Center.