As I’ve noted, AdSense for Search allows you to add a customized search box to your site, and to make money from the ads on the search results page.
To get the code for placing a search box on your web pages, open the AdSense Setup page and click AdSense for Search. You can then choose from various options, including whether you want to have the box search specified domains or the entire Web, and what language should be used.
The site search box is a nifty alternative to Google’s web search box. You set this box up by choosing your domain as the site to search (rather than the entire Web) as shown in Figure 8-32.
Google can only return results from pages it has indexed, so the site search box results of your domains will only be as good as Google’s job of indexing your site. Usually, this is pretty good indeed—so you have a double whammy advantage: users can search your site with a state-of-the-art tool and you potentially increase your revenue.
You can also make some simple layout selections, as shown in Figure 8-33, and decide to exclude adult content from searches by enabling SafeSearch (this option is further down the dialog).
With search box units, as with ad units, you use channels to track the performance of your search boxes. You can also apply competitive search filters to block ads from specific URLs from appearing on the pages generated by your search results. You can change the configuration of a search box you’ve saved using Manage Ads, explained earlier in this chapter.
Once you’ve configured the appearance of the search box, you also need to set the appearance of the search results page as shown in Figure 8-34. Besides using a palette to set the color of text and page elements, you can upload a logo for the page and set the destination that opens when someone clicks on the logo. More important, you can choose to have Google serve the search results page in the open browser window, have Google serve the search results page in a new window, or have the search results appear on one of your own pages.
With your search box and results page options set, next you’ll save the unit settings so you can tweak them as needed. Finally, AdSense generates code for you to use as shown in Figure 8-35.
Copy and paste the code into your web pages. The search box will appear with the options you selected (Figure 8-36); when someone searches your site, the results page will show relevant advertisements (Figure 8-37).
