The content total is the number of impressions and clicks your ad receives when it appears on content sites. These could include major news publications, independently run informational sites, and other sites of varying quality that are not search engines like AOL Search or Ask Jeeves.
If the campaign is in a very competitive area with high click prices, content targeting is always off.
You might try AdWords with content on and off and see if you see different results if the primary goal is sales or lead generation. If it is more of a branding campaign to build awareness and be seen everywhere, then it may be worth it to leave content targeting on regardless of ROI.
Low click through rates on content will not cause your ads to be disabled. Google only used the CTR on Google.com to determine that.
Why are the statistics that I see for contextual advertising different than search?
[adwords.google.com...]
Does contextual targeting affect the performance or ranking of my ads?
[adwords.google.com...]
What is contextual advertising?
[adwords.google.com...]
How does Google target AdWords ads to content-based web pages?
[adwords.google.com...]
How does contextual advertising work?
[adwords.google.com...]
Mods - if any of these links are not OK, please feel free to edit!
AWA