Spotted any changes to the Google SERP lately, that'll be Google testing out the prospect of displaying three top line ads across the results page instead of two.

When you look at the results page you'll see that on some searches there are ads across the top and down the side of the results page, on others they only appear down the right hand side. If there are ads at the top it usually indicates the CPC's are higher than £1 or $1 per click. The reason why Google is obviously tempted to try and fit another ad at the top is because the CTR's on these ads are more than double the ones on the right hand side.

* Source; To The Web, 2004

The motives for 3 top ads:

• If you are a top 3 advertiser in a competitive marketplace this additional access to paid for traffic will be valuable.
• Hypothetically Google will also increase their profits from top advertisers by 2-5%.

AdWordsRep. A pseudonym for someone at Google who represents the Adwords team on industry forums explained:

"AdWords tends to test stuff from time to time, and you're seeing one such test. Probably only a few folks will see it, and then not for long. It's not a permanent change."

Although Google has received criticism for considering 3 top ads, we anticipate they will become a permanent fixture soon.