Have you ever wondered how people get their ads to show within Gmail accounts? Well, there’s two answers…

1. The ads down the right. These are automatically appear as part of the AdWords content system. If you have selected content, they can appear in that spot if they fit the context of the email being read. The downside is that these ads don’t get noticed.

2. The single ad along the top. There is a trick to appearing here, and it is a valuable spot to have. Not only does this location get noticed, the barrier to entry is high, for most of your competitors haven’t even thought of placing ads there, let alone know how to do it. Here’s how:

1st. Add mail.google.com to your list of placements in the Content Network. This can only be done manually, it will not show up as a choice in the Placement Tool

2nd. Choose to use this placement only when setting up your campaign

3rd. The box along the top within Gmail is known as the “funbox”. To have your ads only show there, change the placement to “mail.google.com::Inbox,Top center”

Tips:

• bid higher than usual
• remember that a funbox ad is all one line
• bid on keywords that might appear in the subject line of emails your target demographic read
• bid on the exact subject line of a popular newsletter (perhaps that of your competitor!)

Watch this video, by AdWords Media Planner Austin Lau - where most of the above info came from (yep, that means it is official):