Forum Moderators: martinibuster
My EPC which has been slowly sinking is now at an all-time low. I have had slumps before, but this is going on 3 1/2 weeks. It is down almost 80% from the all-time high.
It is devestaing to put so much work into crafting, customizing, and perfecting new pages only to get the minimum EPC.
Yes, I remember a previous thread about "the advertisers" (of which I am one too) and to stop making it me, me, me. There was definitely some truth to that thread, but I run a very good, popular, content-rich site, and I'm losing steam.
Anyway, I just emailed G to ask them to check for problems.
Any ideas for improving EPC?
Thanks.
Maybe Adwords advertisers are spending their budgets on a month by month basis and as the month progresses, the monthly budget runs out and the click price lowers. My EPC is very high today (1st April) compared to yesterday (31st March).
Perhaps it something to do with the end of the Tax year?
BTW My EPC is down today as well, no idea why. I am in travel.
My EPC which has been slowly sinking is now at an all-time low. I have had slumps before, but this is going on 3 1/2 weeks. It is down almost 80% from the all-time high.
I'm in the same boat you are. On March 4 my EPC took a nosedive, down close to 80%. There seemed to be brief recovery from March 18 - 23 but has since returned to March 4 levels.
I'm trying to be patient with these swings but it definitely seems to be in a steady pattern of decline. I look forward to Y! contextual program.
Please let us know what G response is, if you get one.
"Due to the dynamic nature of Google AdSense, fluctuations in your revenue
will occur. Your earnings will depend on a number of factors, including
the types of ads being served to your pages, the cost per click of these
ads, and your users' clickthrough selections.
Effective CPM (meaning the 'cost per thousand impressions') is a commonly
used number in advertising programs, and allows you to see what your pages
are earning in comparison to other pages or forms of advertising.
This column doesn't represent payments to you - rather, it is figured by
dividing your earnings by page impressions in thousands. For example, if
you earned $180 from 45,000 impressions, your effective CPM would equal
$180/45, or $4.00. This can then be compared to other forms of advertising
revenue, which may not use such directly comparable figures as 'cost per
click.' It can also be used to compare revenue across channels that may
have widely varying traffic - by figuring the earnings per thousand, it's
easy to see which channels are performing better.
For more in-depth information about effective CPM, we suggest doing a
Google search on the term, "effective CPM."
When tracking revenue trends such as effective CPM using your AdSense
reports, we suggest comparing similar days of the week. As traffic volume
and type can fluctuate from day to day, this method will help you to
generate the most accurate reports.
Also, to increase the success of your AdSense ads, we recommend
experimenting with different ad formats and colors to find those that your
users are most responsive to. Try to place ad units above the fold, the
portion of your page that is viewable without scrolling. For more
optimization tips, please visit [google.com...] .
For additional questions, please visit our AdSense Support site at
[google.com...] or feel free to reply to this
email."
I guess the good thing is we are contacting them and they know some of us aren't happy with the recent CPM/EPC declines. All we can do is hope that maybe it will spur some changes.
My EPC fluctuates but so does my CTR and it all seems to even out (within reason) at the end of the day.
You may want to try supplementary affiliate programs or solicit direct advertising on your site as my direct advertisers now compose about 50% of the site income with monthly sponsorships.
Well, I received the same reply about an hour ago.
buz, when you say your EPC is sinking what about your total earnings?
My total earnings have plumeted too. My site is now getting 60k unique visitors a month with a record amount of clicks. Still, I cannot overcome EPC which has sunk to under a dime.
You may want to try supplementary affiliate programs or solicit direct advertising on your site as my direct advertisers now compose about 50% of the site income with monthly sponsorships.
I already have about seven banner advertisers which helps. However, G was still bringing in 75% of my income at the high level.
I don't know if they are ready to oust me or if this is only temporary. Maybe a certain page I put up affected the whole site. I am just at a loss.
Thanks everyone for your replies.
Don't know if you read my recent diatribe, but I revamped it all, the positioning, the ads, and it changed 3x
[webmasterworld.com...]
At a previous shared host I had been warned for using too much CPU so I had blocked most crawlers including G. When I moved to a more accommodating host I forgot to edit the .htaccess file.
Think about it, how else would they pay you less than a dime for clicks that cost 50 cents? They calculate your clicks and impressions, they find out what the most reasonable eCPM would be (like their $4 CPM example, which you can't find at other places like FastClick), they give you a good eCPM and since your CTR is good, they end up taking over 40 cents from your clicks and making a stellar eCPM for themselves.
I really dislike not disclosing the revenue split. Y! should be transparent about it. This is the age of transparency. Everyone wants to know exactly what is happening.
I don't like the idea (afterall that is all it is), but something is suspect considering the amount publishers who's earnings have dropped recently, including my own.
I am both an Adwords advertiser and Adsense Publisher and my costs in Adwords certainly haven't dropped, so I don't see the answer to my earning decrease in Adsense other than the above theory.
Anyway, I removed all Adsense code from websites and replaced with more affiliate ads. I'm in a business where luckily, there are a lot of affiliate programs, and I honestly believe I'm going to do better this month.
My earnings have been increasing steadily with Adsense up to about $500 per month now, but the drop in earnings per click (my own stats tell me it's down to about $0.25-$0.30 per click) is just not sustainable considering what a visitor to my website could earn me.
I will let you know how I get on without Adsense.
