Well, it seems I have a taker on my review trade promotion. This means that there are still four spots left if you want to get your site reviewed.

The subject of this review is AdSense Tracker. According to the tag/description, the site was set up “for the purpose of testing Google AdSense ads to see if they actually work and if they actually pay off” and it looks like for a time, that is exactly what this blog was.

Ad Tracker, as the site’s author goes by, started this blog on July 5 (which is a mere 3 days after I started this site and that makes it the blog I know of that is closest in age to my own) and has amassed some impressive stats in that short time. In fact, at the time of this writing she has a Technorati authority of 181 and rank of 26,802 and Alexa rank of 330,784. This girl definitely knows how to market a blog.

The first thing that you will notice when you go to her blog is that it is very pink. I’m not saying this is a good thing or a bad thing, just warning you, it is pink. Other people might suggest that she change the color, but the shades she uses are not terribly hard on the eyes and seem to work for her so if she’s happy with the look, then great.

One thing that Ad Tracker is really doing right is creating good content. There hasn’t been a whole lot of talk about Google AdSense ads (the original purpose of the site) lately, but this is possibly a good thing. The content of this site is good in two ways. First of all, it is entertaining. The tone of the writing is such that you know the author is just writing as the thoughts come and is very conversational, this is something that I think I need to work on and it makes her posts very fun to read. Another way that the content is good is that it is informative.

For example, she recently wrote a post titled “I’m Flisstered!” informing readers that she had discovered another blog stealing her content. This was followed by the post “Flisstered No More” advising that the plagarizing site had been shut down. The third post in this series was a very informative post on how she discovered that there was someone out there stealing her content and showed her readers how to check the same things she did and what to look for.

I also like the dedication that the author of this blog has. She adds a new post nearly every day and two on some days. This means that there is always something new and fresh to read and I’m sure it plays a part in keeping her readers coming back.

Another thing that is absolutely amazing about Ad Tracker and her blog is that she replies to every single comment that she receives. At times she may reply to two or three people in the same comment, but there are not many bloggers out there who reply to each and every comment. This is something I definitely commend.

Now, before someone goes thinking that I’m going to have nothing but positive things to say about AdSense Tracker (the blog, not the author because this is a review of the site and not the person behind the site) I am going to change gears and make some suggestions for the improvement of the site.

The first thing I am going to do is pass along some criticism I received in a recent review of my site. There seems to be a fairly significant amount of wasted space to the sides of the content. This is quite noticeable at 1280×1024 and higher resolutions. At 1024×768, it is not quite as noticeable, but there is still plenty of room to widen the site and give it more room. Like I said, it doesn’t seem to be too huge of an issue and I only mention it because it was brought to my attention on my site and caused me to make some changes that I feel helped make my site a lot nicer.

My biggest criticism of this site is that it is hosted at blogspot. I personally have never used blogspot and have nothing against them, but this site is such that I think Ad Tracker would be better off purchasing a domain name and hosting the blog elsewhere. Not only would this give her more freedom with the site itself, and make the URL look better and easier to remember, it would also remove the extra menu bar at the top of the site. Another benefit of moving away from blogspot is that it would be much more convenient for readers to leave comments. The current comment system is not very reader friendly and does not match the theme of her blog at all.

Along with the move away from blogspot, she should take the move as an opportunity to re-brand herself. The AdSense Tracker name no longer fits the content of the blog and does not really provide for great branding opportunity. Another issue with the name is that about the time she starts getting recognized on a larger scale, Google will probably try to shut her down due to the trademark of the term/name AdSense.

While I am on the topic of names and branding, my one criticism that I have of the author of this site (rather than the site itself) is that she does not give us a name, or at least something to call her. She only refers to herself as Ad Tracker which, as stated before, does not really fit.

The rest of my criticism is really just on the layout of the site and most of these issues could be solved in a relatively short period. I guess I’ll start at the top of the page. The name of the page is linked back to the home page, which is good. However, there is no navigation menu at the top of the page.

Moving to the sidebar, there is the expected RSS button. This is followed by a selection of flags from foreign countries. These are icons that users can click to view the page in their native language. While this is a handy thing for her blog to have, she should have them labeled in some way so that people know what they are. Next is where you would expect to find other navigational links.

There is a link labeled about, but that only takes you to information about the translation tool that is used on the page. This link should be renamed to prevent confusion because most users are looking for navigational links at this point. The “About Me” section shows a small picture of the author and a sentence telling the reader who she is. There is also a link to “view my complete profile” (courtesy of blogspot) and that is it.

A more appropriate (and, yes, generic) design for this section would include a link to a contact page/form, the categories that the blog covers, and the archives (which are near the bottom of her sidebar) before moving to the other stuff.

The next thing in her sidebar is what I can only imagine is a script pulled from blogTV. I have no real idea of what this site is, but am guessing it is something like MyBlogLog. If that is the case, due to it’s lack of popularity, I think she should consider removing it. I do not see blogTV on any of the other blogs I visit and therefore have a hard time believing that it is bringing in much traffic for the amount of space it takes up.

Below that are three icons that she should be proud of. They are all badges that indicate that she is a blogger who recognizes fellow bloggers and takes part in the community aspect of blogging. However, these badges should possibly be moved to the bottom and/or rearranged to take up a bit less space.

Next, we have her recent readers or “fellow trackers” listing from MyBlogLog. Her list definitely shows that she has plenty of visitors, but I am more a fan of the layout with the larger images. The larger pictures give the readers more recognition and also encourage people to come back more often in order to keep their image on the list to be shown.

Below the MyBlogLog script, we get to the archives which should be moved up and the blogroll or friends list. The blogroll could probably be moved up and remain immediately after the archives, but could definitely use a title/heading. After adding the heading, she should move the “blogroll me” link to the bottom of the list and add romandock dot com as an entry on the list.

As for the footer of the site, there is definitely some cleaning up that could be done there as well. Currently, the footer consists of links to a variety of blog directories and catalogs. While some people may find these links useful, they seem quite cluttered and are not likely benefiting the site in any way.

All in all, this blogger whose name I do not know has definitely earned the spot I have given her in my “Blogs I Read” section of my sidebar. If you have not checked out AdSense Tracker yet, I suggest you do so. How many other bloggers can come up with a word like flisstered?