JenSense

AdSense Optimization Boot Camp Tip #3 

Update April 2009: The newly updated privacy policy (which includes specifics for interest based targeting) can be found here.  Privacy policies must be updated by April 8, 2009.

With the new AdSense terms & conditions changes made last week, one of the requirements is that all publishers have a posted privacy policy in place that advises visitors specifically about cookies and web beacons.  Here is an AdSense-friendly version of a privacy policy that JenSense readers are welcome to use on their own sites.  Obviously, replace ___.com with your own website name and/or URL.  And you may need to tailor bits of it to suit your site - if your site targets a specific country, you can change the ISP and city examples with ones in your own country.

Privacy Policy for ____.com

The privacy of our visitors to ____.com is important to us. 

At _____.com, we recognize that privacy of your personal information is important. Here is information on what types of personal information we receive and collect when you use and visit _____.com, and how we safeguard your information.  We never sell your personal information to third parties.

Log Files
As with most other websites, we collect and use the data contained in log files.  The information in the log files include  your IP (internet protocol) address, your ISP (internet service provider, such as AOL or Shaw Cable), the browser you used to visit our site (such as Internet Explorer or Firefox), the time you visited our site and which pages you visited throughout our site. 

Cookies and Web Beacons
We do use cookies to store information, such as your personal preferences when you visit our site.  This could include only showing you a popup once in your visit, or the ability to login to some of our features, such as forums.

We also use third party advertisements on ____.com to support our site.  Some of these advertisers may use technology such as cookies and web beacons when they advertise on our site, which will also send these advertisers (such as Google through the Google AdSense program) information including your IP address, your ISP , the browser you used to visit our site, and in some cases, whether you have Flash installed.  This is generally used for geotargeting purposes (showing New York real estate ads to someone in New York, for example) or showing certain ads based on specific sites visited (such as showing cooking ads to someone who frequents cooking sites).

You can chose to disable or selectively turn off our cookies or third-party cookies in your browser settings, or by managing preferences in programs such as Norton Internet Security.  However, this can affect how you are able to interact with our site as well as other websites.  This could include the inability to login to services or programs, such as logging into forums or accounts.

AdSense Privacy Policy Provided by <a href=”http://www.JenSense.com”>JenSense</a>

Don’t forget you now need to have a privacy policy on all your AdSense sites, this isn’t something that is optional, and when you agreed to the new terms, you agreed to do this too.  I don’t know how strict they will be policing this new change to the terms, but it is always better to be safe than sorry when it comes to protecting your AdSense account.  You don’t want a black mark against your account because you haven’t done this, I will be making the changes to all mine this week.

Update March 2009 - If you are looking for a new privacy policy to cover the new interest based targeting, I will have a new one up in the next few days

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