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I want to block my AdSense ads from showing to users in specific countries. The low payout countries are making my average CPC drop. I don't want to show my ads at all to users in those countries.
How I can block my ads? I already know about DFP, but I'm hoping there is another way.
First you have to understood google terms and conditions for cpc in that you cpc doesn't affect you click for low paying country. Your cpc is same for all countries that you have mentioned.
If your not using google polices to place Ads on your website such as DFP then you can make your Ad only for particular countries like all in DFP you can increase your ad revenue by placing the Ad that you think okay and you decide the cost of the particular place on your website without Google intervention.
You can also do it with .htaccess and that will work with static sites, but you'll have to do some work to identify all the IP ranges involved. Be sure not to block your own.
You can use GeoIP database and some GeoIP library for the language your site is build with to detect the country and then don't include the adsense code if visitors country matches one you don't like.
But there really is no point in doing so. Artificiality increasing CPC by blocking poorly performing countries won't have any positive impact on your total earnings, probably a bit of the opposite. What's the point of higher average CPC if you get less clicks and less money?
This is not the place to provide code, but you could wrap your adsense code in some logic to detect the country of the visitor and not display for whichever countries you want to not see the add.
But really, so your CPC drops...why is that a problem except in your head? You still receive the same total payout don't you?.
You can use an ad server such as Google Doubleclick for Publishers (DFP) Google makes DFP available for free for most websites.
To use DFP, you have to change the JavaScript tags that power your ads. You would need to set up your ad slots (inventory) in DFP, and generate new JavaScript code to include on your site. Unlike AdSense, DFP uses a block of code in the head of the page in addition to the code for each ad slot.
By default, DFP shows AdSense ads for every slot. DFP allows targeting by demographics. You could set users from various countries to not see ads, or to see "house ads" that advertise other portions of your own site.
Unfortunately, DFP has a pretty steep learning curve. It is much harder to use than AdSense. It used different terminology for the things that AdSense does.
