You may have noticed that AdSense ads are sometimes displaying an underlined hyperlink in the display URL. From a usability perspective, I find the underlined URLs to be distracting. And as a publisher, I find it equally annoying.
This is probably just a temporary test to see if underlined URLs get a better clickthrough rate, but I believe at best it will prove to be a wash versus the non-underlined URLs, and at worst, will show a decline in CTR. There doesn't seem to be any inherent improvement in ad quality by showing an underline. They just look off-kilter.
What do you think, fair reader?
So listen up, Google. If I wanted to display an underline in my site's ads, then I would. But I don't, so please stop the test, Google! Or at least, make it optional.
Turns out this was a result of a Firefox extension called Linkification. I guess I'll have to ask the extension developer to find away not to underline AdSense URLs!
Nothing to see here. Move along, move along...
Posted by Cory Kleinschmidt
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