Increasing Adsense Revenue Using Adwords

How can you work out if it will work?

[ftwb05]

Hi!

Firstly, my apologies if there is already a thread discussing this issue, I have read a few, but I have trouble getting my head around this issue, which at its basic is:

Is it worth using Adwords to increase Adsense revenue?

In my particular case I have a hobby website that has different pages relating to aspects of that hobby.

I get most of my traffic through Yahoo and MSN, with a trickle from Google.

I started running Adsense a couple of months ago, and I am heading towards my first cheque! (Sad, I know, but this is just a hobby for me!)

Now, if you take so far today as an example, on my website I've had 15 visitors and 90 pageloads (according to my sitestats), who've clicked on 6 adsense ads.

So that makes a click-thru rate of 40% per visitor (which is typical every day), but a click-thru rate of only 2.5% per ad.

The average ad makes me 14c.

So if I can get targetted visitors at 5c an ad thru Adwords, for every 50c I spend, 4 people should click on my adds, so I'll make 60c.

OOps! Now i've gone thru the figures, I see that this isn't really a worthwhile proposition.

I'll post anyway, to see if anyone has anything to add.

Thanks, FTWB

[marcel]

The figures you mention might not seem much, but, in effect you will have a free advertising system (well actually a profitable one).

Don't forget, if just 1 out of the 10 visitors bookmarks you, or tells a friend about a site, you will be getting return visitors for that 5 cent click!

[elsewhen]

i have found that it is very difficult to get this to work. you can occassionally get it to work on certain pages, but it takes a lot of work, and constant monitoring... if one or some of the higher-paying advertisers pause their campaigns, for example, you better pause your own ad - quick!

in my opinion, the best way to get adsense growth, is add more content pages and use some of the techniques discussed in the other forums here at WW... traffic that you get from the natural serps costs nothing, and then 100% of your adsense payout is profit.

[ftwb05]

Thanks for your replies,

I guess I was just getting a little excited about trying out adwords... the lure is great, but that margin is a little tight.

I guess I should get back to SEO,

Or maybe I'll have a dabble anyway.....!

[jenkers]

try it out.

Once you get down to the keywords that work for you at that price you may find that smart-pricing automatically lowers your bid cost.

You might get lucky and get hundreds/thoudands of clicks and make a nice little sum of cash.

More likely you'll find out that your core keywords only deliver a small amount of clicks but you still make a couple of bucks a day (which goes on and on with little maintenance).

Also, as you have already identified the page(s) where you might be able to do this - it might be an idea to use the same content but create a 'special' landing page more designed for Adsense exits than your standard site - therefore raising the revenue but not necessarily messing with your standard site.

[ftwb05]

I think I will have a go, with a small daily budget, just to see what the click thru is like, I'll keep you all posted!

Thanks again, FTWB

[MediaSpree]

My Experience doing this has been pretty good. If I spend $5.00 in Adwords I will make $7-10 in Adsense revenue that day. If I spend $20 in Adwords, I will make $25-30 in adsense a day. My Page CTR hovers around 50% when i use adwords, down to 10% when not. I think someone here said it best when I asked the same question just starting out, "you have pre-qualified clickers coming to your site, chances are they will click again" Now, the downside of this is at the end of the year the Government is going to eat all my profit in taxes... :(

[ftwb05]

Just filling out the adwords form now, trying to come up with some decent keywords - I think I'll match to specific phrases - thats the "" tags - right?

But I've just come up with a problem - I'm in the UK, my estimates were in $, yet my adwords will be in £s - so what I thought I was going to make will not be right!

Time to do some more calculations!

Thanks, FTWB

[elsewhen]

best of luck with your new endeavor. one other thing to consider, though... dont forget to count the time it takes to create and manage the campaign. it would probably be wise to keep a constant eye on everything so you can pause the campaign along with the fluctuations in the ad bidding.

it is so easy to forget the opportunity costs of implementing and running with new ideas... any time you spend is time that you could have spent creating new content that is virtually CERTAIN to bring you more money via adsense.

i spend the majority of my webmastering time adding to my sites. an adwords-to-adsense technique at best will get you a few clicks and some extra money.

adding new content, however, has virtually unlimited upside potential. when i double the number of good pages on my site, i double (and sometimes triple), my revenue for the site. if your site is in a niche, and you have completely maxed it out, you can start a new one.

[bnhall]

I figure if (eCPM / 1000) > (Adwords CPC * 1.5) then it's a good deal.

[ftwb05]

Good point, I guess I'm just dabbling with Adwords to see how it works, to see if I can learn how to use it best on my hobby site, then apply those learnings to my serious .com.

You are right though, content is king, and I think I'll go and add some new pages now....

Or maybe just check the stats again...

Thanks, FTWB

[spaceylacie]

ftwb05, come back and let us know how it goes.

I've been thinking about using Adwords too, but have the landing page be my free newsletter(no Adsense present). Just to build up my subscriber base and hopefully they will visit my other pages while they are there(pages with Adsense). My current newsletter subscribers are worth a pretty penny to me, they make me money every month. I wouldn't mind a few(thousand) more of them.

[JoaoJose]

That in the stock market has a name that I don't know how to translate.

Keep in mind that for that strategie to succeed you have to bid 5c that means that:

1. You're in for very obscure keywords
2. You're going for mainstream keywords and you'll be the last click.

In scenery 1 your visitors will be less targeted.
In scenery 2 they've already clicked the ads that are showing on your site so they probably will not click again.

I've tried and it didn't work but good luck :)

[asianguy]

MediaSpace, are you allowed to advertise your site in adwords with google adsense on it?

I am not sure if you can do this...?

[FromRocky]

I've done this, using PPC for AdSense, since 2003. With these states,

So that makes a click-thru rate of 40% per visitor (which is typical every day), but a click-thru rate of only 2.5% per ad.

The average ad makes me 14c.

I think you will be lucky to make any money in less than 10 % of the time.

[cagey1]

Watch your cash flow, Adwords will charge your credit card within a few days and the credit card company will want their money in 25 days, but you may not get an Adsense check for 60 days.

If you don't pay the credit card company right away (because you are waiting for your Adsense check), you will have to factor into your ROI the interest they charge on your unpaid balance.

[sirkei]

Yes, you area allowed to advertise your site in adwords with adsense in it. And i have tried testing pages with high paying keywords with adwords but it didnt work out.

I am not sure why but when i advertise high paying keywords come up in my internal pages such as example.com/high-paying-keywords-page/ most people either dont click on it or the ads on that site will show cheap ads. Guess it's because of imbalanced impression for that page.