Google-AOL Impact on AdSense Sites

What are the potential ramifications of AOL-sold ads on AdSense sites

[PaulPA]

As more news on the Google-AOL partnership emerges I think more questions of its impact on AdSense partners will begin to surface. For instance, in a story in today's WSJ, this line is thrown out at the end of the article:

"AOL also will be able to sell some ads that appear on Google's network of affiliated Web publishers"

The obvious question this raises for me as a Web publisher is: who will be paying? My agreement is with Google and not with AOL.

But this also raises other questions for publishers:
* will publishers need to sign a different agreement with AOL?
* will publishers be able to restrict or block AOL-sold ads?
* will CTR on AOL-sold ads be separated from Google-sold ads?
* will Google share Google Analytics information with AOL for AdSense sites?

I'm sure there will be plenty more questions.

[hunderdown]

Google is paying us. As I understand it, AOL will be serving as a kind of commissioned sales force in this case. We don't need to sign any additional agreement, from what I can see.

Other than that, not clear to me what the impact will be on us. Will it be overall positive because it will increase ad inventory and thus drive up click prices, or negative because AOL is getting a cut? May depend on the sector. We'll see.

[Hobbs]

From what I understand from the announcement, AOL will bring to the table new media rich ads (flash?) as well as what was previously said about more advertisers.

This will not mean a special AOL cut at the expanse of publishers, their cut will be off Google's share (I think).

Additionally I read that Google bought 5% of AOL for 1 billion dollars, which in my book reads as a symbolic financial marriage (alliance), meaning Google the previously solitary player is aligning itself with the other big boys probably for a major assault in the future on Micro$oft's turf.

It's all good news and if anything, will mean more money in the AdSense pot, and Yahoo and Microsoft competing more aggressively for publishers' inventory.

[NoLimits]

My personal opinion on the whole matter is that it will create a spammier image of Google. I also believe that the only people who made out in this deal are AOL.

[PaulPA]

Well let's think this through a moment, if I'm an advertiser I would try to seek the option with the lowest cost to me (Google-sold ads vs. AOL-sold ads). Why would Google allow AOL to place ads if it could result in LOWER ad revenue due to competition for selling the ad? I suppose more total ads can be generated with more than one seller selling ads, but the idea of competition between the two doesn't seem to make a lot of sense.

Clearly there is something else that will evolve from this deal that will not place Google in direct competition with AOL for advertisers. For instance, maybe AOL will be given ad space that is not competitive with Google or maybe the type of ads AOL will sell will be different than Google's ads. Either way I still wonder if AdSense publishers are not likely to see a different approach to the current AdSense business model.

[ASFx2600]

I've already started seeing flash ads on my website early this morning. It seems like theyre all ford ads though which are completely untargeted. That said, my earnings for today are already double what it usually is at this time of day, so the flash ads seem to be attracting attention even though they arent related to the content of my site in any way.

[remove]

yeah i'm seeing ford ads too, although it appears to be merely a text ad rather than flash. either way, completely untargetted.

[icedowl]

Not sure how the Ford ads relate to the topic of this thread, but I've been seeing them too. Text ads and flash/image ads. Looks to me like they're doing site targeting on every sort of site. Tossing them into the filter.

[ken_b]

Ford ads huh? I've been run over with another Ford brand, image ads and expanded text ads for the last two weeks on nearly every page that runs image ads.

A few days ago I added a small adblock to some pages hoping to get at least one brand related ad back on the pages. Nope, the Ford brand popped up with a regular text ad.

An interesting side effect of this ad blitz is that my Adlinks performance has gone nuts as well. I'm guessing that folks aren't seeing the usual text ads so they are clicking on the Adlinks to find them. :)

The general category is right for me so I don't mind.

And if the AOL deal brings more mainstream ads like that, as I've seem some WW members speculate about, I'm gonna love it! The money from these ads is fairly good compared to what's normal for my site.

But on my site these ads are for what I think is a new product intro, so I don't really expect them to last that long.

[remove]

there's an interesting article about the impact of the G-AOL deal here [marketwatch.com]

[crackerjack138]

What does it matter. You dont' control the pricing for those ads. You will get paid what Google wants to pay you like it has always been.