Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Now in Feb. I am getting the same number of clicks per day, but only 1/3 of the pay. What gives?
I checked the ads and they are the same ads that were showing before.
Since I am new to adsense and only started in Jan. I do not have any historical data to compare this to.
Is this normal?
It seems that my problems started Feb. 1 or 2.
I have read that post and it deals with changes that took affect mid January...
No, it doesn't.
Similar experience here - new in January, great results. Then in February, the ads all changed until 2/6 when they returned. During the first few days, clicks were WAY, WAY down - even though traffic was way, way up. Earnings per click were down to 1/3 of previous.
During the weekend and todasy, so far, it is back to normal, EXCEPT price per click is WAY down still.
I would say that it's just a case of bidding the price down and a market/demand situation, except for the strange behavior last week, which makes no sense at all. The only conclusion I can draw is that several things changed at once, made worse by the impression hijacking fraud.
About the only thing you can do is to continuously improve your sites and attract more users. However, it's incredible to me that everyone is left to speculate with no info from Google.
What a strange eco-system this is...
My earnings per click have just took a nosedive.
I have read the other post mentioned above and agree with some of the posters.
Feb 1 = Very bad pay per click
Feb 2 = Normal ppc
Feb 3 = again Bad ppc
Feb 4 = Normal ppc
Feb 5 = again bad ppc
Feb 6 = bad ppc again
Feb 7 = looking bad so far.
I think either G is changing the commision rate or that the advertisers have not reset their budgets for Feb. They were probably watching the super bowl.
Or this could be the effect of the keyword hijacking.
I think either G is changing the commision rate or that the advertisers have not reset their budgets for Feb.
If either scenario were true, why would some of us be doing better in February than we were in January?
AdSense earnings are influenced by many, many variables, such as:
1) Supply (the number of available impressions for a given keyphrase.
2) Demand (how many advertisers are bidding on a given keyphrase).
3) "Smart pricing" discounts for advertisers (and how those discounts are calculated at any given point in time).
4) The compensation formula for publishers (which almost certainly isn't a simple percentage split, and which may be adjusted periodically to reflect Google's profit or loss for individual accounts, incentives or disincentives for certain types of content, and who knows what else).
5) Seasonal variations (e.g., fewer ads for Ontario fishing trips in November, more ads for skiwear in January).
6) External factors (such as the recent "keyword attacks" on certain keywords, which may or may not have affected content ads).
1. There was a technical issue with Adsense (and Adwords) around Feb 2-3. This put a sharp wobble in earnings over those days for a large number of sites. However, that was a glitch which has been resoloved.
2. Around the same time Google performed an update of its Search Engine (perhaps as part of a defense against the DOS it suffered on Feb 2-3). It affected many sites in spectucular ways. This could also impact indirectly on earnings. How? If there is a change in the traffic profile to your site (eg poorer targeting of traffic for AS ads), smart pricing may alter your earnings. This impact could vary widely between sites.
3. As part of the SE update, your traffic may also be different. Some higher paying pages may be getting lower hits from SE traffic, while lower paying pages may get higher. Some lucky sites may get the reverse. From the outside it looks like the impressions are the same, but this doesn't give you the full picture. Channels would help confirm this - but only if you had them running before the update.
4. If advertisers are getting more natural traffic from Google (as a result of the update), they might pause their AS ad campaigns. Conversely, some sites will see a better payoff if an advertiser's site is getting lower traffic and needs to spend more to keep up its numbers.
The date this all started is real obvious and stands out and is quickly identified when the stats are reviewed. No questions G did something drastic to CPM on 1-28 or else it is major technical difficulties.
Update: Just looked at my G stats (just before midnight) and see today Feb 7 appears to be the poorest day in history for me, with CPM less than 1/2 of typical CPM's from the recent past. No obvious effect on impressions and clicks as they are very high today, in fact near record high levels, it's the CPM and income which have fallen off the cliff. Anyone else see this today?
7% lower CTR
8% lower EPC
Jannuary and February compared
This combination makes a little bit frustrations, because I hoped to have an other record month
