Australian SEO Consulting Services, Digital Media Advertising, Website Visibility, Internet Branding
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
Google Adsense News
Internet is gradually becoming a billboard for Google's ads. Like it or not, it will stay that way. And as long as advertising revenues are helping small web publishers it is a positive outcome for most of us. Since March 2005, Google allows to "accurately disclose the amount of Google's gross payments". If you wonder how much other websites and blogs are making from Adsense you can visit AdMoolah.com and query its earnings database. And consider to view the story in USA Today on: Google's AdSense a bonanza for some websites.
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Sounds like about 1/100 of a cent per visitor from the info on the data base, Interesting.
ReplyDeleteHow Goggle Adsense Can Exploit You.
Now before you assume this is just another rant against a big company, let me say that I feel Google Adsense is a wonderful creative idea that has many positive qualities.
The Adsense detection software is a marvel that does an amazing job of detecting relevant ads to place based on the content of the blog or website. It is a real tribute to Google that they allow Adsense to be placed on nearly any site regardless of size. Adsense is also extremely easy to use and the ads are excellent and can actually add to the appeal of your site and provide your readers with a useful source for products and information. I think Google is a fine company with many great services. I also have no doubt that Google will pay any money they say they owe you.
Google Adsense Should Tell You What Your Revenue Is Based Upon.
The problem is they will not tell you what your revenue is based upon. They will not tell you the formula they use to determine what they owe you. They do not allow you to click through on the ads or on keywords and ads for the search program so you can determine for yourself what will generate a good return for your efforts. In effect you work for them, but they will not tell you anything meaningful about what they will pay you. Instead they say see what we pay you; if you like it stay; if not, you’re free to leave the program. What is so unfair about that is you have to do all the work of setting up a site, perhaps tailor the content to try to appeal to the advertising you expect to appear, and then hope you have guessed right despite having no useful data from Google about what can generate revenue. That is simply exploitive on the part of Google. The effect of this is it could cheat you out of either money or your efforts in building your site. Many other Affiliate Programs give precise information on what they base your revenue upon. Google is exploiting their position as a powerful player on the web and not telling you what your revenue is based upon.
An Example
Lets take my example. I decided to try to generate some revenue from Google Adsense by doing exactly what they want, building a blog site with useful and meaningful content. I built 19 such blogs on a whole range of subjects that I though would result in good ads from Google Adsense. Indeed the Adsense program did a great job of generating great ads for my sites. The problem was I seemed to be generating very little revenue. I felt that the reason was, I was not getting enough traffic to the sites. To generate much more traffic I need to spend a good deal of money on traffic generating ads and spend a lot of time getting listed in directories, link lists, rotators and that sort of thing. Now I felt it unwise to spend the money and time if Adsense would not generate enough revenue to make the effort worthwhile. So I decided to test the system by clicking through and search keywords with Google search to watch the results to see if it would be worth my effort and money to generate additional traffic. My efforts seemed to be successful. The Adsense account showed a reasonable return of about $100.00 or so. Feeling the test was successful, I started to work on my traffic generation plan. That is when I received a short email from Google saying my account on all 19 sites had been cancelled and all my earnings confiscated. The reason was I had clicked through on my own ads and from my own search box in violation of their rules. No request for an explanation from me - nothing. Their decision to confiscate my earnings is of course final, after all they have all the power.
Now I agree that clicking through on my own ads and searches is not fair to the advertisers, but I did it not to cheat the advertisers or Google, but to learn the most basic information that Google would not reveal to me. Thus it was Google that was cheating me as well. Now did Google give the money that the advertisers spent on that ad back to them? I very much doubt it. Thus Google confiscated my earnings and took the advertisers money spent on the ad as well. And they say I cheated them. I spent weeks making 19 sites to participate in their program and was never compensated a single penny.
Now if I had just followed their rules no matter how unfair or exploitive, then I would not have been dropped from the program. On the other hand I would have had no way to know what I might have been paid for my effort. It just seems terribly unfair to me. Are any small sites actually generating reasonable revenue from the Google Adsense program?
George
There are smaller sites getting good revenue from AdSense. Check out AdMoolah.com. Webmasters can enter their earnings and compare them to others.
ReplyDeleteI see an awful lot of blogs that have Google Adsense ads on them, and no matter how one-track the content is (a coffee blog, for example), the ads are all for surfing gear and travel to surfing destinations.
ReplyDeleteI imagine this might have something to do with the lack of revenue many folks complain about with Adsense.
That, and we go to blogs to read, not shop.
Loved reading your blog. Found it surfing at blogexplosion.
ReplyDeleteRegards,
http://outrageous-ebay.blogspot.com/
We will see more AdSense with new program which is testing selected group of password protected websites in a program called "Site Authentication" where they allow publishers to run Google AdWords at the sites where user authentication is required.
ReplyDeleteAnother resource for you: http://www.ng2000.com/fw.php?tp=adsense
ReplyDelete