signor_john - 10:41 pm on Jun 8, 2009 (gmt 0)

Are they clicking less, showing restraint as pointed out by LifeinAsia? Or as freejung has suggested, are advertisers simply paying less per click?

On my site, users are clicking less but advertisers are paying considerably more per click than they were a year ago. Different publishers will have different experiences, of course. But the fact remains that direct-response ads are designed to elicit an inquiry such as a click, a phone call, or circling a number on the classic bingo card. Common sense would suggest that inquiries are harder to generate in a recession than in an economic boom. (Even at the best of times, the default user behavior is not to respond to a direct-response ad.)