Forum Moderators: martinibuster
I am not sure, but doing a study on the stats for one of our web site, I feel like payout percentage has dropped a lot compared to the early days of AdSense.
It would be very much helpful if Google would tell publishers how much percentage they are giving out? (25%, 35%, 50%... or what?)
AdSense is a great program. Competition will make it even better.
Sure, there is. You can stop running AdSense ads. If you think Google is cheating you, don't let Google profit from your site.
My numbers are way up, and I've been using AdSense since the beginning. I'd never claim that my own experience is a "major trend," though. It's always a mistake to make broad assumptions based on a limited (and personal) sample.
It is that mentality that lets big companies go by and allow them to do whatever they want, I don't know about EU countries, but here in USA we do believe in certain things and especially when a company starts growing toooo big and plays with its own rule of self-benefit, you will for sure find things changing in certain ways.
Also, I am not trying to make broad assumption on limited and personal sample. I will have to agree that I have not seen the stats of sites having more than 20+ million page views per month, however I still cannot ignore what I learned after seeing an average of 15 million pageviews every month.
And yes what I am talking about is a 'major trend', maybe not with your sites, but on the sites where I have seen, it is a 'major trend'.
My numbers are way up, and I've been using AdSense since the beginning. I'd never claim that my own experience is a "major trend," though. It's always a mistake to make broad assumptions based on a limited (and personal) sample.
Just because one or few people have not seen or are interested in certain feature from Google, that does not undermine the importance and need of having it.
You're assuming that there's a percentage. In reality, there could be any number of percentages, since it's unlikely that Google's payout formula is a flat percentage split.
What "liberties"? We have the liberty to dump AdSense at any time. Nobody forced us to sign long-term contracts or give up control of our sites. (And we aren't employees of Google, so talk of organizing an "AdSense union" is pointless.)
Also, google does not charge their adwords customers less CPC money when the clicks from publishers site.
There are 'many' publishers who have seen huge ups and downs in revenue from Google. While the CPC rates at AdWords haven't changed that much or have actually increased.
Now anyone with a right mind or good calulator , can tell you that there is something going on that should not be. In addition, if Google is giving out percentage range to publishers, then in a way, they will be requird to stick to at least minimum percentage numbers they have given out. However with current method, they can play with percentages anyway they like - and we don't want to see a good company like Google being corrupted due to money or popularity, afterall, we all love google, right?
I am happy with my current adsense and will continue untill I think i can earn more with alternative sources
I fully agree with you NeedScripts.
BTW in EU there is also very strict regulation for competition and taking advantage of monopolies or oligopolies (like Adsense). Just to mention the $497 million fine that Microsoft has to pay to EU for its Windows Media Player policy in Europe.
The fact of being "happy" with our income from Adsense does NOT mean in any way that we should forget all proper business practises and ethics.
BTW in EU there is also very strict regulation for competition and taking advantage of monopolies or oligopolies (like Adsense). Just to mention the $497 million fine that Microsoft has to pay to EU for its Windows Media Player policy in Europe.
The fact of being "happy" with our income from Adsense does NOT mean in any way that we should forget all proper business practises and ethics.
I also think that calling Adsense a monopoly is going a bit too far. Online advertising is many times bigger than whatever millions Adsense is pulling down. The Microsoft issue is not really a good example. I also don’t see Google acting unethically in any way.
The important thing to me is that I am making multiples of what I could make running another type of advertising in its place.
Does the current arrangement gives Google a definitive advantage as to their relative position with a publisher?
Does it leave the door open for Google to decrease the percentage payout to publishers?
Will Google manage adsense with their primary benefit as their #1 goal?
Well, the answer is yes to all of them.
If Google is indeed giving different percentages to different publishers, then on top of it not being in their best interest to give that information out because of competition, it would be a bad idea to allow publishers to compare since a lot would cry foul! When they find out John Doe is making 1% more.
I will also have to say that March has so far been the month where I have made the most money with the program. That EPC has not noticeable decreased, that CTR has not noticeable decreased, and that I am very happy with the program so far. Just in case someone is trying to map a “major trend”. On the other hand, the reason for the increase in revenue is a continuing increase in visitors and pageviews for the last three months.
Sure, we can leave them, but who would we go to? Adsense pays way more than any other form of advertising I'm currently able to negotiate for my website.
When the competitors show up, and they absolutely will considering how much money Google is likely making from Adsense. We're all going to apply for all the programs and then test them out to see which one pays us the best CPM. Then we'll dump whoever pays less. Google knows this.
If Google reveals the payout percentage, will you be more loyal? Do you promise to never drop them for another program? Of course not.
By not revealing the payout percentage, Google is innoculating themselves against the onslaught of competitors that are about to enter the scene who will attempt to cherry pick the best content sites. They set up the channel system because it does help both the advertiser and Google earn more overall revenue. But how does revealing the payout percentage help Google? Not one bit, so why would they? To stop you from leaving? You're going to do that if someone else pays you more money. Which is why they aren't revealing this information in the first place.
As for concerns that Google is cheating publishers out of their rightful earnings, let's face it: Google can easily do that whether or not it discloses the payout formula. If you don't trust a business partner, then common sense would suggest that you find a new business partner.
IMHO, it makes good business sense for Google to keep its payout formula secret. Why? For two good reasons:
1) Disclosing the payout formula would make it easier for future competitors to lure away the most profitable AdSense publishers by offering them a higher payout. That might be nice for the publishers, but--as Universetoday points out--it certainly isn't in Google's interests to facilitate such cherry-picking.
2) Disclosing the payout formula wouldn't stop complaints from unhappy publishers; if anything, it would lead to an increase in such complaints, because unhappy publishers could gripe endlessly about specifics.
Side note: As has been pointed out in other threads, it's worth remembering that Google isn't selling AdSense as a conventional ad network. Traditionally, the sales pitch for ad networks has been something like: "Instead of selling and serving ads yourself, let us take on those chores, and we'll split the revenues." AdSense is different; its sales pitch is more like: "Give us space on your pages, and we'll generate additional revenue for your site." In other words, the correct metric for determining whether AdSense is worthwhile isn't what percentage you're getting, but how much revenue you're earning.
AdSense is NOT a monopoly by any stretch of the imagination. Any publisher kicked out of the program could instantly replace them with dozens of CPC, CPM and/or CPA revenue streams. Being the only one who does exactly what you do does not make you a monopoly. Being the best at what you do does not make you a monopoly.
EFV, I don't buy into your first argument. As you yourself have pointed out, the exact revenue share is not very important in terms of determining how much revenue a sponsor can bring in. The only thing serious publishers will look at is the bottom line.
But I agree with your second argument that disclosing the formula would only increase the dissension. For many sites there is no program on Earth even close to AdSense; and yet people never tire of griping and sniping. Every time a publisher got kicked into a lower tier there would be a flame thread. And can you imagine what would happen if Google were to publicly disclose that they are reducing payments across the board, even by a tiny amount? Thermonuclear war.
1. Study a maths book on the subject of errors.
2. Have a guess at how many variables there are in the revenue equation.
3. Have a guess at the possible error in each as a %.
4. Work out the range of revenue possibilities from the error %ages.
And that will be one thing that's going on for starters.
Given that Google as any normal business will probably want a consistent and predictable revenue stream (or a steadily increasing one!), rather than a jumpy one, perhaps they have some sort of differential control loop working...
In the world of automatic process control, these loops are designed to bring stray parameters back towards a setpoint.
So if Google say want to stay around $****xx dollars per time period, the loop is set to control around that point by increasing and decreasing the payouts / charges. However if the loop reacts too quickly the whole thing goes unstable, so its done in gradual steps.
Now if a marketing initiative sends one of the parameters rapidly out of spec. (eg. advertising Adsense to everyone), the whole thing will take a long time to stabilise, because there is no reference point for what changes will bring it back into control.
?
1) Make a Chanel composed of a single page that gets a very low click through rate.
2) Implement an AdSense tracking code or service on this page (like the "related pages" service), a service that reports to you the URL of the ad that was clicked on a certain page.
3) Wait for the day when your AdSense tracking tells you you got just one click through on the page. Make note of the ad's URL.
4)Access your Channel data for that page and see what income you received.
5)Go to AdWords, see what the bidding price is for that URL's ad. (I am assuming that AdWords shows bid prices just like Overture dot com does.)
Take all of the appropriate numbers and do the math to find the percentage you were paid.
That sounds like an awful lot of bother just to learn the percentage that one person earned from one ad. I can think of more profitable ways to spend my time. :-)
Why hasn't someone nailed down exactly what percentage they were paid for at least one AdSense click through?
But they have, and I agree with the guesstimate, but I won't risk breaking the ToS and repeat it. It should be easy to find with a Google site search. It comes up regularly.
Your thinking is fine - i.e. wait for the first click after midnight PST and see what the payout figure is. The difficulty is that you cannot assume that all publishers get the same percentage or that more expensive clicks are given the same break. Since foreign advertisers pay a different figure for the minimum click, you'd need to have pages that target the US and then hope that you get a minimum click ad.
A key component of a business relationship is trust, and how I can I trust a company that won't tell me the basis on which I'm being paid? The revenue numbers already fluctuate a lot, and with their non-disclosure policy, it leads me and others to wonder if Google isn't manipulating the numbers for their benefit. They probably aren't -- if they did, and it came to light, I believe it would be extremely damaging to them -- but the doubt exists nonetheless. Their behavior certainly doesn't encourage the level of publisher loyalty that could be otherwise achieved.
It would help if Google would at least publically establish a policy saying that they won't change the payout percentages without providing advance notice to existing publishers.
Another problem with their policy is that it makes it difficult to compare AdSense to other programs. Sure, I can put another program on my site and try it for a while. But in my case, that's not an easy or cheap thing to do.
I suspect that many publishers, myself included, will move to the new programs from Yahoo/Overture or MSN, when they're available, if only because their policies are likely to be more open. Google has too many secrets for my taste. It just smells bad.
Another problem with their policy is that it makes it difficult to compare AdSense to other programs.
Exactly. Google would be foolish to help future competitors cherrypick its most profitable publishers.
I suspect that many publishers, myself included, will move to the new programs from Yahoo/Overture or MSN, when they're available, if only because their policies are likely to be more open.
Why do you think their policies will be more open?
Why do you assume such networks will even welcome non-"premium" publishers?
And why would you select an ad network based on its "openness" when the real measure of an ad network is how much revenue it can deliver?
Google has too many secrets for my taste. It just smells bad.
Look, if Google wants to cheat you, it can easily do so regardless of whether it reveals the exact nature of its payout formula. And let's face it: No matter how many trade secrets Google chooses to reveal, there will always be publishers who are convinced that Google is hiding something.
My suggestion: If AdSense is generating enough revenue to be worthwhile, use it. If not, don't. And if you're genuinely concerned about being ripped off, sell your own ads direct. That's the only way to be sure that you aren't being cheated of revenue by an ad network.
I calculate EPM for each of them. No problem to see which programs pay more for the same number of visitors/impressions.
people! can we get a rough idea about how can they make different percentage for different publishers with the computer programs?
dhaliwal
people! can we get a rough idea about how can they make different percentage for different publishers with the computer programs?
I am sure, there are some publishers who likes to speak about tons of variations that they think Google might be using payout for publishers via AdSense, and if there could be some, then it could also include
1) average daily clicks from site
2) Total traffic of the site
3) time between clicks
4) clicks on different ad types
5) .... etc
Now I personally think if Google is using any form of formula to track the clicks and other stuff.. but still what I dont' understand how come these so called AdSense patriots forgets to understand that still Google will be having a specific percentage rate that they are giving out to publishers.
Also, it is to be considered that google does not charge its adwords customers any less, then their regular CPC rates. So by impemeting such so called formulas or in simpler words - hiding the adsense payout percentage, all I believe they are doing is, taking bigger and bigger share of the pie.
Our main website gets more than million page views every month and if I were to check the stats of all the network sites, it would be more than 3 million page view every month. After reading adsense TOS I cannot give out the numbers, but I can for sure say that Google's payout for many high profile keywords/site has been reduced by one fourth or more, while the CPC that they are charging to their AdWords customers has increased.
Now.... what is hard to understand is, if the CPC for adwords customers is increasing, then how come AdSense publishers are saying less earning.
if Google wants to cheat you, it can easily do so regardless of whether it reveals the exact nature of its payout formula.
it never happens but people sure do love banding those words around!
back on planet Earth.....
It doesn't matter if Adsense gives us full disclosure. It is by FAR the best content-driven advertising network out there. It has increased a lot of our profits. Soooo, regardless if Google changes the payout percentages ~ we should all be making way more money now because of them.
I for one am truly happy to get "for sure" cash from the Google giant. And there's also bragging rights with the cute girl at the bank when I go to deposit my "google" check. lol
It is by FAR the best content-driven advertising network out there.
Soooo, regardless if Google changes the payout percentages ~ we should all be making way more money now because of them.
I agree that Google payout use to be more and is still more then many other companies, however if you really think about it and if you really want it to be much higher then other places, then the best way is to somehow make sure that Googles does not decrease the numbers in a way that they get way bigger share of pie, and cut down payout to publishers just enough to leave it little bit more then other Ad Networks. Now if Google says that the payout will be between 45% to 55% or some other percentage numbers, then there could be control on how low they would go while cutting down the payout percentage for the publishers and we all can be happy by knowing the fact that Google AdSense will remain one of the best paying network for the long time.
it never happens
"class action lawsuit"....the three most commonly used words on webmaster forums after "search engine optimisation"
it never happens but people sure do love banding those words around!back on planet Earth.....
There are different types of people in this world,
1) Who like to stand up for something right and good (or something that they believe in)
2) Who will normally find reasons to argue with type "1" people and tell them, why they should not do what they are doing or show them that the road ahead is very tough.
3) Who knows what is right and good, but prefers not to take initiative and wants someone else to take the action, as taking the action is not always the easy thing
4) Who does not have enough courage to stand up against companies(or anyone) who are big, or standing up what they believe is right.
===============================
over here we are not talking about asking google to do something that wrong or illegal or unethical, instead what we are asking is to make the mutually beneficial relationship between Google AdSense and Publishers more strong and reliable.
Without google disclosing the percentage numbers, there is no telling how low (or even high) they can go. However if they disclose the "Adsense payout percentage", then it can make a huge difference, as now there could be other ways of varifying to see if they are doing it the right way.
Can you tell me when was the last time you did a job, where you didn't knew how much you will be paid? Also if the you did a commission job, how interested would you be willing to do a job where the payout percentage is not disclosed to you?
it is something to think about.
You retain that perfect freedom....just to walk away.
I agree that it makes sense to try and change the system from within but G have their own good reasons for witholding certain information. If your bottom line isn't good enough, leave. Go elsewhere. There are other similar programs on the net now. There are no bars on the windows. The door is not locked.
When you make living out of your web site...
If only I could make a living from my websites. I've got a lot to learn toward that goal. AdSense is a start.
Can you tell me when was the last time you did a job, where you didn't knew how much you will be paid? Also if the you did a commission job, how interested would you be willing to do a job where the payout percentage is not disclosed to you?
Bad analogy. Google isn't our employer, and we aren't doing "jobs" for Google (on commission or otherwise).
Google is more like a value-added packager that marks up the cost of our OEM product (ads, in this case). To us as vendors, the important thing isn't what customers are paying, but what we're getting paid. If we feel that our revenues are adequate, we can continue to let Google package and resell our product under its label. If we think the amount we're receiving is too little, we can cut out the middleman and try to sell our product directly to customers.
To summarize:
THE BAD NEWS: Google's mark-up may be of academic interest, but Google is under no obligation to disclose such information, and there are good reasons why it's unlikely to do so.
THE GOOD NEWS: You can run as few or as many AdSense ads as you wish, and you have the freedom to dump AdSense without notice whenever you find a more profitable substitute.
The result is that each user has to monitor cpc and results and watch their own limits as to what is viable expense for adwords adverts and viable income for adsense publishing.
If adwords becomes so expensive as to be unviable for your campaign then you have to intervene to stop or modify it .. if adsense becomes too low an income to justify inclusion then you have to intervene stop or modify that also.
Google has reserved its own rights to change its prices in both directions in a way that seems to me to be invisible to the user so "buyer beware" or at least "buyer be aware" :-) must be the order of the day.
It seems to me like a permanent auction in both directions where precise prices per sale are not known in advance but determined by machine interaction, the house percentage commission is not known and can presumably be fluctuating according to I dont know what, and its not possible to be present at each auction transaction only to set general guidelines.
Please correct me if I am wrong. :-)
If only I could make a living from my websites. I've got a lot to learn toward that goal. AdSense is a start.
Bad analogy. Google isn't our employer, and we aren't doing "jobs" for Google (on commission or otherwise).
Now every smart (business) person would agree that when you are in any sort of work/business relationship, it is good to know about numbers, especially when you are the party who is receiving money from the other party.
To us as vendors, the important thing isn't what customers are paying, but what we're getting paid.
You are satisfied with Google just because it seems to be paying more money then other companies, but in this situation all what you are doing is relative comparison. So now let’s assume, if other companies would pay only half of what they are paying right now, then you would be totally fine if Google would pay only what these companies were paying before. However you forget to understand that while in any sort of partnership you don't just compare your income from your new partner with other/old partners. However, a reasonable earning would be a good split from the total earning based solely between your partner and you.
Suppose if you were to compare two Ad Networks, company X and Google AdSense. Suppose company X is paying you US$ 1.00 CPM for the banners where they are earning US$ 1.00 that would mean they are splitting the earning 50%. However in the case of Google, if Google is making US$ 40.00 per click and is paying you only US$ 2.00 for that click, and your website’s output is averaging 3 clicks for every CPM, then a person without any business sense would for sure be very pleased, as he/she is making US$ 6.00 for every CPM from AdSense. However, any smart person would look into the percentage split and see a huge problem in this work relationship (business partnership). As for every US$ 120.00 that Google is making, they are paying you only US$ 6.00 or in other words the payout by Google AdSense is just 5% compared to 50% payout by other Ad Networks.
I am sure there are many many and many more AdSense publishers out there, who have seen huge drop in their earnings from AdSense. I am pretty positive that if Google were to disclose the adsense payout percentage, the cries of less payout from adsense publishers would be far less then what they are now.
Just because a company is in a high revenue/profit margin, that does not mean, they can abuse their position and manipulate their partners.
To summarize:
My feeling is that it will be just as hard to pin adsense income down as it is to pin down present and future costs of individual adwords adverts or campaigns.
if adsense becomes too low an income to justify inclusion then you have to intervene stop or modify that also.
Vishal
You are satisfied with Google just because it seems to be paying more money then other companies...
Actually, I never said I was satisfied. In fact, I've often expressed dissatisfaction with AdSense's lack of quality control and advertiser controls, and I'm certainly not pleased with the drop in revenue that I've experienced since April 2. However, that doesn't mean I think Google is obligated to share information that it considers to be proprietary. AdSense is Google's ad network, the contract's terms are clear, and Google can legitimately say that we accepted those terms when we enrolled in the network.
I am sure there are many many and many more AdSense publishers out there, who have seen huge drop in their earnings from AdSense.
True, but such huge drops certainly aren't universal. Some publishers are reporting better earnings, others are reporting drops of 90%, and some of us are in the middle. As to why the changes in payment vary so much, it seems more likely to me that the changes have more to do with perceived value to the advertiser (and the new variable discounts for advertisers) than with a change in the payout formula. If Google just wanted to keep more of the proceeds, why would it raise the payout for some publishers while cutting it by varying percentages (ranging from moderate to extreme) for others?
Now if these webmasters/publishers actually were to think long term, they will realize that it is in their and google’s best interest if the adsense payout percentage were disclosed.
It might be in the publishers' best interest, but I can't see how it would be in Google's best interest. As I've pointed out before, revealing its payout formula would simply encourage cherrypicking by future competitors, and Google would be foolish to help its rivals (even if such cherrypicking might be welcomed by the publishers who'd benefit).
Bottom line: Publishers are certainly welcome to say "We'd like to know the payout formula," but it's unlikely that Google will share that information.
I agree with much of what you say but I suspect Googles increase in cut is closer to 5 - 25 % depending on impressions ctr conversion data etc.
I think that they have decided that it costs the same to manage and administer all publisher accounts and have therefore changed percentage cut accordingly ,
To confuse things further this month they have tried to address some of their advertisers issues with ROI on content sites and possibly even tweaked the algo for delivery
Google appears often to implement multiple changes at the same time RE: florida etc and I am sure many of the others on this board who come from an IT background know that change is the biggest enemy for support costs and multiple changes can often be the straw that breaks the camels back
In IT change management is a science that needs to be managed and controlled , the problems that google have could well be many many smart PHD'S with no idea of how many changes can cause loss of control and difficulty to find which change caused the problem , they iether do a rollback or problems can take 2 weeks to 6 weeks to resolve
I hope that they can learn from the teething problems they currently have and reign in PHD's slightly
sorry to rabbit on but from an IT background it looks so familiar to similar change management issues
I don't know what they changed on April 1 can only guess at some of the possibillities and suspect there are others
steve
Google does not want to disclose the Adsense payout because it is their model. We, as publishers, don’t totally satisfy with the offer but agreed to sign on with this model. So why do we continue to complain about non-disclosure of payout when the model has not changed? As a business, we go for the best payout. Right now, Adsense’s payout is still the best. If someone knows something better, just let us know. We might follow and leave Adsense behind.
IMO, several reasons why Google does not disclose Adsense’s payout:
1. Adsense is based on a new concept and runs on a trial-and-error approach. The payout schedule will be updated and changed when it has more data. Google does not sure its payout schedule in three months from now.
2. Its payout schedule is so complicated. Our Income Tax model may be too simple compared to this. Therefore, it generates more complains, explanations, questions and dissatisfactions among publishers once the schedule is disclosed.
3. It follows the “non-disclosure earnings” model as most public and private companies applied.
4. It didn’t want the competitive to know.
5. All of the above.
