Google Modifies Adsense Referral Program, Again

As a response to Adsense publishers outrage over the previously announced change in the Adsense referral program, Google is modifying the program policy yet again. Whereas a week ago, Adsense publishers?? earnings would depend on their location, it would depend on the location of the users referred by the publishers.

As stated in the recent Inside Adsense post:

The changes to referrals promoting AdSense will now depend on where your users are located, regardless of your location as a publisher. You??ll earn $100 for every user you refer to AdSense who is located in North America, Latin America or Japan when they generate $100 in AdSense revenue within 180 days and they remove all payment holds. You??ll no longer be paid for users you refer who are located elsewhere. These changes will go into effect the last week of January.

So, it means that even if you are not located in the said regions, you can still continue to earn from Adsense referral unit for as long as you target users from those regions. You would need to make sure that the targetting settings on your Adsense account is targatted towards users from the said regions.

All is not lost then for those publishers who earn a lot in referring Adsense from their blogs/sites. This in a way erases the discrimination towards publishers who are not located in the three regions. What is not clear still is why give earnings only for referred users coming from North America, Latin America and Japan.

At any rate, in addition to this announcement, Google Adsense also took the opportunity to announce yet again some changes on its referral program. This time for Google Pack and Firefox. From $2 for every referral of Google Pack Google is reducing it down to $1 a referral. The same rate would apply for referred users coming from China. And Google??s reason, its all part of a continous evaluation process of the referral program to make them effective and sustainable.