Disappointing result - AdLinks

I got the channel report for new AdLinks

[itisgene]

I put the Adlinks in to one of my web sites after it became available. It was above the fold almost on the left top to get maximum clicks to see if it has content CPC or Search CPC. Well, guess what? I had about 25% CTR TO the Adlinks page (meaning only Adlinks Impressions) and No real CLICKS from the result page! 0% CTR! The web site gets usually two digit CTR for Adsense and that's why I put the Adlinks on the site... If I got the 25% clicks to my Adsense ads...

Another interesting thing is the CTR for other channels on the site didn't decrease that much. That means I wasn't going to get the other clicks anyway. (That makes me feel a little better...)

I should have a few clicks from yesterday's channel reports by tomorrow. I will updaed you with the numbers.

[tebrino]

Like with all things on this forum, when one says that things are going bad, the other one claims totally opposite. My reply won't be exception ;-)

First results are quite impressive after 6 hours of use (two days ago), excellent CTR and CPM. Also my overall earnings are 30% larger. So I assume that it has something to do with these new ads. More information in next few days...

[OptiRex]

$6 from the first few hours so we'll see how it goes. I've just added it to a load more sites and hope that it doesn't affect "normal" Adsense earnings and is a real addition.

[howiejs]

Interesting. I will test this today on a site where the targeting is a bit off (same general industry, different service). Maybe people will be more interested in clicking the general link heading and reviewing the ads . . .

[blaketar]

My results are horrible!

Close too 8000 (7852 to be exact) impressions - 2 clicks for a grand total of 13 cents...

[Atomic]

I also am starting to see large impression numbers without any clicks. Perhaps we are not using Ad Links correctly? Hopefully someone that has some success with Ad Links will be kind enough to share their secret once some decent data comes in.

[rookiecrd1]

I'll let you know how mine are doing tommorow morning.

[JoaoJose]

The problem is targeting. I don't understand how this is working.

I thought the ad links were basically keywords. Clicking on them should give you a list of advertisers who use that keyword on adwords...but in my case some advertisers don't have anything to do with the ad link, even the language is diferent....

Let's see what happens soon.

[novice]

"but in my case some advertisers don't have anything to do with the ad link, even the language is diferent"

How do you know? Did you click on the links? I read a post by ASA saying not to click the links, has that been changed?

[oddsod]

I read a post by ASA saying not to click the links, has that been changed?

I'm ignoring that advice. As are a lot of others. What's next? That you shouldn't view your own pages because that skews the stats?!

[JoaoJose]

What's the problem on clicking the links? You don't earn anything on that.... I have to know if the ad links deliver relevant ads in order to decide if I keep them or not...

I donīt think you should be so scared about all the rules, sometimes we just have to use our common sense.

[Vespasian]

I'd like a definite answer from Google on whether it is OK to click on the initial 4 or 5 Adlinks links that pop up the Adsense ads. It seems like it should be fine. But has anyone checked with Adsense to make certain?

[annej]

My impression was that is wasn't advised to click on the links we see on our page because it would skew the stats and make it look like we had more impressions.

But I can't imagine putting something like this on my site without checking what kinds of ads I'm getting. Hopefully they will soon find a way we can check without clicking on our links.

I'm sure clicking on the actual links to the advertisers' sites would be against TOS.

I'm only trying AdLinks on sites where regular AdSense doesn't work. I didn't have enough in my stats from two days ago to judge how it's going. Tomorrow I should be able to get a better idea.

[itisgene]

somebody posted a link to get what it looks like. Try "cheeseburger" on google and one of the result page has "AdLinks" on it. It's not mine. So I can click the Adlinks (only Adlinks! :)) and see what the linked page looks like.

[clearvision]

What you see when clicking Ad Links:

10 Adwords listed on a white page as follows.

Ads By Google
Kids Widget Toys
Get great toy widgets for kids
http://widgetsforkids.com

So it looks like a search page with less information and gives the visitor an option of selecting from 10 different ads.

Someone posted they had #*$!x amount of impressions and only xx amount of clicks. This is okay if your adsense is still producing clicks. It could be sheer placement on the site, color scheme etc.

I have found the click income from my adlinks page to be higher than regular adsense ads (but it is too soon to tell if this is a trend).

[doingthistoolong]

From what I've seen, I woundn't worry about putting Adlinks up and not knowing what the ads look like. None of your users are clicking on them - so it won't make much difference.

Actually, I did notice a boost in the first 24 hours of putting an Adlink on my most used page - but it drifted back to normal within a day.

[dazzlindonna]

Here's what I don't like about adlinks. It feels like spam. The user thinks these links are navigational links, only to find a bunch of ads (and nothing else) staring them in the face. Now the user feels deceived and is ticked off. Or, if not ticked off, then they feel like they've just hit one of those spammy scraper sites, and they are annoyed. I won't subject my users to that. But, hey, that's just me. :)

[clearvision]

I just moved mine from the bottom left to the upper right corner....mucho increase within the last hour. Not the usual so it must be the recent adjustment.

This will probably be like Adsense, it performs well on some sites, and not so well on others.

[Sweet Cognac]

I also decided to try out the adlinks this morning. Put a 5 linker on my index page. The index is loaded with keywords, yet only one link showed up and it was totally off topic. I even tried refreshing it a couple times.

So, I removed the adlinks and put adsense back up.

If it's not showing links on my index, it can't possibly work on the rest of my pages.

Why would it only show one link?

[stardoc]

I got my first channel report for adlinks test pages today. Seems to be a good add on as my income for those pages increased by 25%. But I'll still wait for a week before implementing it sitewide to see whether this increase is due to initial curiosity of my site visitors.

[garyr_h]

Adlinks performed very well for me below the fold. Increased earnings by A LOT compared to the half banner I had there before. CTR doubled as well.

I just exchanged a some ads on a different site with the adlinks... we'll see how that works out later on. Also would be nice to have more than one day under my belt to make an educated decision.

[HitProf]

Report from the first couple of hours shows 0 clicks. Just checked the pages: most adlink boxes are blank! They were OK when I put them up, normal AdSense is showing OK on those same pages.

Added: I can't say I'm very impressed with the quality of the links either, showing Christmas reated links in March :(

[perfectlover]

Are we allowed to test adlinks? I mean tosay, can we click on AdLinks but NOT ADS?

[Seige]

Adlinks is wonderful on my site. I made it blend into the site with the appropriate color, and earnings has more than doubled. I've checked total clicks by adlinks channels and compared it with the rest. And it appears that the adlinks on my site has more clicks compared to all other adsense blocks.

This is a brand new start.

[TinkyWinky]

Cheeseburgers works - if you need to, check out Death By Cheeseburger to see an example.

IMO having read the posts it obviously will depend on the nature of the ads and the vertical channel they display.

However, I do feel that the display of the results could be better implemnted to achieve far greater clickthroughs. The list looks very cold and hardly inviting.

I think I will wait on this thread before adding to my sites!

[OptiRex]

First full 24 hours, top lhs above navigation brought in an extra $12+ over average.

Thursday's figures were well up therefore it will be interesting to see what channels brings tomorrow.

Here's what I don't like about adlinks. It feels like spam.

All my Ads are well on target. Very impressed so far and there is no compulsion for the visitor to actually click on the Ad Links results is there?

[tebrino]

After first complete day results are fantastic. I inserted Adlinks on only one page bellow navigation links with different color scheme to make it obvious that these are ads. This one small block of ads on only one page made 35% of all earnings on all sites!

[freedata]

Are AdLinks stats shown seperately from regular stats? How can I know for a given channel with one AdBlock and one AdLink block on the same page, how many clicks were received by AdLinks and How many by the AdBlock?

[tebrino]

Create separate channel for your Adlinks ads

[Atomic]

I haven't had a lot of Ad Link clicks but the few I have had show an excellent CPM that more than makes up for the low CTR. I can't wait to see how things look after a month.