Can I share Adsense profits with site members?

How to track clicks?

[chicora]

Hi - I recall this topic being discussed here in the past, but couldn't find it.

I have a consumer ratings site and was thinking that one way of encouraging users to submit their ratings (instead of merely using the site to do research) would be to create a program where members can participate in the income from clicks on Adsense ads on their ratings pages.

Has anyone tried anything like this? I'm also uncertain how it would be implemented. I suppose I can't really use my own Adsense account to track the clicks as they only allow for tracking 200 content channels (I would need thousands).

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

[leadegroot]

Have them submit their adsense id and use it to display the adsense on that page?
I understand this is fine, *provided* you only display ads for one ID on each page! (as always, if in doubt, check your plans with Google)
You're right, there arent enough channels to manage a big forum, and it would mean administrative overhead for you anyway - let Google do it for you :)

[chicora]

So -

They would have to be Adsense members (and thus would have their own site that was already approved by Adsense).

I put their Adsense ID on the page on my site where their rating is displayed.

Adsense tracks the clicks and they get 100% of the proceeds.

This could be a nice incentive to them and could encourage more ratings on my site. I wouldn't participate in the click revenue though - I was hoping to do a 50/50 split.

[steve40]

chicora
I think I would be concerned about posters clicking their own adds and you would become associated by website and could recieve the dreaded adsense account suspended ,
It may be a slighlty better idea to identify sections of the site say 200 review pages as a channel and offering to split revenue with all posters on that channel dependent on number of reviews submitted and accepted in a month
So for example a busy poster who provided 20 reviews in a month would recieve 20 X x% of 10% of what the channel income was , this way you would get the reviews and only pay once for a review at that period and should avoid the banned by association email as any poster would only recieve a percentage of the overall revenue of the channell not sure how it would for you just a crazy possible idea

not sure if i explained it well sorry

steve

[walkman]

>> where members can participate in the income from clicks on Adsense ads on their ratings pages.

and Joe, thinking he is about to earn more keeps clicking on the ads, and even tells his friends to do the same. There has to be an easier way to get suspended from Google then this.

[chicora]

Thanks Steve - this is an interesting idea. If I set a minimum level of participation to qualify, then this would encourage ratings. Of course I would have to watch out for bogus ratings done just to qualify ;-)

The click-fraud potential is minimized, though it still seems possible that the person might go crazy with clicks, and ask friends to as well - hoping to boost the total that they are going to get a small percentage of.

The more I think about it though, I wouldn't be surprised if just the fact of having such a program of shared Adsense revenue could be considered by Google to be illegaly encouraging clicks - as it would be implied that the more clicks the more shared revenue.

[BillyS]

chicora -

I've thought about the revenue sharing model myself. It's a tough one because if you need to tell the contributor where the money comes from, then the temptation to click arises.

I've got too much invested in my site to throw a carrot like that out to someone. It would have to be someone I knew and trusted.

[netchicken1]

I tried splitting the forum income with my other admin, but she didn't want it! Gee I would have been happy with an extra $40 pm :)

[Heartlander]

How do you suppose Adsense "revenue sharing forums" are able to get around the click fraud issue?
There are some rather large sites doing this.
I attempted to install it on mine as well, but ran into some problems with the channels not reporting correctly.

[walkman]

>> How do you suppose Adsense "revenue sharing forums" are able to get around the click fraud issue?

some have managed, for now, some have probably been banned, and some will always manage to do so, however I would not risk all on something I cannot control.