This is something I’ve been trying to say for a long time now.

From Aaron Wall’s SEO Book:

Banners vs Contextual Ads:

Many web surfers have become banner blind and ignore the top part of a page. Banners have horrible conversion rates.

I do not usually use the default banner size unless I feel it fits well with the site design. The best revenue options are usually link rentals or context-based text ads.

Good advertising does not look like advertising.

One site that I work with sells links for over $500 a month per link and only made about $30 a month off AdSense. Other times AdSense can make far greater profits. Depending on the market, it may be best to use one or the other or a combination of both.

This is especially true for me because I use Firefox with the AdBlock
extension and Filterset.G extension installed. I haven’t seen a banner
ad in almost a year.