AdSense not working with WordPress 3.2.1

  • After numerous searches I have not been able to find a relevant discussion that offers a solution or insight into this problem.

    I have been using AdSense on a hand-coded domain (Xenite.Org) for several years. The account is still active as I am able to get ads to display on static pages.

    In June I wiped the root domain and installed WordPress. I have since upgraded to version 3.2.1. The installation is running in multi-site/multi-user mode. I have set up several sub-domains as secondary sites through the network.

    I installed various plugins primarily for social media and spam control.

    I have downloaded several free themes including Magazine Basic and Fresh Ink’s Magazine theme. I have set up several blogs using all the same plugins and both of those themes as well as the Twenty Eleven theme.

    Any attempt to install AdSense code has produced only temporary success in getting the ads to display or no success at all. I have used several WordPress plugins that purport to handle AdSense and I have simply embedded the code in widgets. I even went so far as to embed the code in a theme PHP file.

    Nothing works.

    I have tried to embed the AdSense both in post bodies and the sidebar. My preference is to get the AdSense to display in the sidebar.

    I have disabled all the plugins and I have even switched out the theme for Twenty Ten. No configuration produces any AdSense.

    Nonetheless, I was able to create a static HTML page tonight, embed AdSense in it, and see the ads right away. Here is a screen capture:
    https://www.xenite.org/adsense-test-01.jpg

    I am confident I have eliminated any interference coming from my server by testing the static HTML installation. The AdSense continues to run just fine on a couple of sub-domains where I have not yet replaced the static HTML code.

    Until this evening I had blocked some advertisers in AdSense. I removed all the blocks. No change in results.

    I am able to get Amazon widgets to run in the sidebar but sometimes the top widget would “slide up” under the menu/header.

    As best I can determine this is an incompatibility between AdSense and WordPress. Several people who use WordPress and AdSense tell me they are not experiencing this problem.

    My guess is that it has something to do with the Multi-user/site configuration. I have run out of ideas of things to test for or search about.

    I have seen several reports of similar problems here and at the Google Webmaster Help Forums throughout the year. In all the similar cases no solutions have been provided. Clearly there are problem reports where people have misconfigured their sites or their AdSense and after trying a few suggestions they got their AdSense to work. I have been unable to generate any success following the suggestions in those discussions.

    I’m hoping someone can help replicate and solve this problem.

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  • Thread Starter sffandom

    (@sffandom)

    To follow up, though I’m not quite yet ready to say it’s fixed, PeggyK in the Google AdSense support forum noticed that I was not explicitly permitting the AdSense bot to fetch my pages in robots.txt.

    I am pretty sure I rewrote the robots.txt file when I rebuilt the site in June. She suggested that my catchall Disallow at the end of the file was probably blocking the AdSensebot. I commented out those two lines last night and now we’re seeing ads again.

    I have seen intermittent ad displays before in the past couple of weeks but I think this may have been my problem all along. The old robots.txt file had been around for years and I probably just overlooked giving explicit permission to the AdSense bot.

    I’ll check in here either later today or tomorrow and if the ads are still displaying that should be good enough to say this issue is resolved.

    Thread Starter sffandom

    (@sffandom)

    The ads are still running fine. This issue is resolved.

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)
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