Adsense on Forums?

[HostingDirectory]

I am considering buying a website that is well established. It currently has 5000 forum members, over 10,000 threads and over 60,000 posts.

The website is a webmaster resource centre but currently is 98% forums ( the other part needs some work ). So it basically i am buying a established webmaster forum.

Currently they have no form of advertising in place. I am thinking of placing adsense of the forums. The forums are vbulletin.

Anyone have any idea of what i might make from adsense on such a established forum.
Does anyone have a forum of around the same size that uses adsense?

Just looking for an idea of what it might make.
As its webmaster related i should imagine the clicks would generate a fairly decent amount of money but apart from that i have no idea if the forum is worth the investment needed to purchase it.

[morpheus83]

I would suggest going for CPM based advertising.

[JuniorOptimizer]

I agree with Morpheus.

Try to sell ads to sponsor independently. AdSense performs terrible on webmaster forums.

[robsynnott]

For such a specialised topic, you might also want to consider using affiliate programs.

[wehberf]

As one of the guys I work with once said:

"Forums enrich the lives of the people that visit them, people can get answers, deliver ideas and increase their well being. There are locals, new people show up all the time and lend to the stablity of the neighborhood or community.

10 years ago this used to be called the neighborhood park. Have you ever paid to enter your neighborhood park? Somethings never change.."

[oldskool79]

Actual here in Southern California there are a few parks that you must pay $5 to enter. Also, all the so called 'public' beaches charge you to park there ($10!). And it certainly doesn't seem to stop people from going...during the summer there is sometimes a 3 to 4 hour wait to get a spot.

[hyperkik]

wehberf, generally speaking, which ad format and position do you find works best in your phpbb forums?

[endomorph1]

Just want to add my piece to this one.

I have a Snitz based forum running adsense. It has an average of 8200 unique's a month with a good repeat visit from members.

Average Daily Imp 1,260

Average Daily CTR 4%

Adsense brings me in 4 figures a month regularly.

[scottct1]

I have a VB3 forum, and it does well on Google but I believe it could do better, as a look at the stats as I type this we have had over 2,500,000 Pageviews for the month but only 9,000 Clicks. (These numbers are not exact as I don't want to violate anything with Google...)

Even with the low clicks I am earning more then enough to pay for the sites expenses. I am very happy with Google

[Atomic]

I wish I could duplicate that. I also have a Snitz forum with 3 times the unique visitors but with a CTR that's less than half of 1% with 2,500-3,000 impressions. All that and making less than a dollar a day. Some staff members don't want me to "junk up the site" with too many ads. It almost pays for the hosting but knowing what could be done just kills me.

[HostingDirectory]

Endomorph1 can i ask what the content subject is of your forums?

Are the forums webmaster related or have a niche theme?

[endomorph1]

They are timeshare related. If you want to see the site, PM me.

If I think you are going where I think you are going, web hosting is a relativly high paying keyword, but there is masses of competition out there, so it wont be easy.

I also have a hosting site showing Adsense and the money is p-nuts!

[scottct1]

Mine is Home Theater / Satellite Television related.