Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Either way I think it is time to separate some of the fact from fiction about "smart pricing".
1. No one knows exactly what "smart pricing" is. All the so called opinions are just that. Google has issued very little information other than the initial letter of April 2004 (which is referred to in many posts). I said it at the time and will repeat it again the letter said nothing of substance. Sites that should lead to higher "conversions" should recieve higher paying ads. That's it! There was no indication how this was to be accomplished. ( read some of the previous threads from April 2004 for some great discussions on tracking conversion information)
2. As noted above "smart pricing" has been in effect in some form since April 2004. It is not new as some posts seem to imply, didn't start this month or even this year. Some well respected people believe as I do that it was simply an adjustment mechanism between ROI from search and content pricing.
3. Ask around to the publishers that have ridden out the highs and the lows of the program over the past couple of years. Although there seems to be an unusual number of my earnings have dropped posts recently, we have been reading them for two years. (and have posted a few too) The longer term publishers have not hit a panic button which leads me to believe everything is status quo.
4. There are many factors which can affect revenue to the publisher. Some include the amount of advertisers in a market niche, budgets of advertisers, time of year, your site acceptance and trsffic, the quality of the traffic you haave as a publisher and many more. On top of that is of course smart pricing.
5. CTR vs CPC. Yes there is a factor. Exactly what it is again no one knows exactly. However since adwords pricing is based on a "quality score" that includes both price and CTR of an ad, we as publishers will see the same effect. Have always said the quickest way to reduce the CPC is increasing the CTR of a small group of ads. My feelings have always been that the eCPM was added to reinforce this. This will reduce the cost to the advertiser. For more information on this see the adwords forum discussions.
6. Smart Pricing ....site or page discussions seem irrelevant to me. Now when the discussion moves to the broader diuscussion of account vs sites this is relevant. It is something that my actions can influence.
So...smart pricing is nothing new. It probably is not the main reason for decreasing revenue that many posters are seeing, since there are so many other factors. Just another day at the adsense trough....waiting for that ever magical pipe dream of a higher paying ad revenue source to mature.
For those that will want to be critical of my support of adsense...well...ask around:) As a side note (might as well get this off my chest too:) for those attempting to use statistical data to determine trends....for revenue over a month don't diagree with the approach and use it. For anything else it is not based on reliable data. Clicks that are not paid for, delays in reporting of income to day totals and various other questionable information lead me to question the data.
I believe I am in a business relationship with an ad supplier and nothing more. Couldn't care less what share I recieve of the revenues (oops another rant) ...simply because the Google money is real....I have it in my account. Be as secretive as you want. Every month they pay on time to what they have told me I have made. They seem to now be a viable company and will in the future continue to pay me. We will continue with our other sources of revenue and adjust between programs to maximize our returns. (return is cash in the bank)
How do you define "blame smart pricing". I'm not blaming smart pricing. I'm saying smart pricing doesn't really exist. It is an illusion to convince people that Google is taking measures they aren't. Or in other words, Public Relations.
Big corporations use PR. It's a fact. And where Google used to have more beef, now they have more marketing.
As far as the negative SP threads, etc. These things seem to flare up from time to time then fade off for a while.
