HUGE Drop In My Adsense Revenue

[sschlee]

I am experiencing a huge drop in adsense revenue as of February. I was usually getting a daily average of $9-10 a day and now I am averaging $1.67 a day. I would attribute that to slower traffic, but my traffic and Google AdSense impressions have more than tripled in the past couple of months. We are adding fresh content on a regular basis and the ads are showing the same as they were before on existing pages. Is anyone else experiencing this or is it just me?

Scott

[blasto333]

It is against the agreement you made with google to disclose specific earnings. Please do not share your numbers, it could get you kicked out. (Just a warning)

[richmondsteve]

sschlee, to understand what's happening I suggest measuring the percentage change in:

1. True CTR (clicks / impressions excluding PSAs/AAs)
2. EPC
3. PSA/AA rate ( ( # of PSA + # of AA impressions ) / AdSense Reported Impressions)

You can get #2 from the AdSense reports. To get #3 you can get the denominator from the AdSense reports, but to get the numerator you have to have had alternate ads implemented (and no PSAs) and track the # of associated impressions. Once you have #3 you can calculate #1. Once you have these 3 metrics you'll have a good picture of what's happening so you can investigate why and do what you can to improve what you can control.

[Mario]

@ #3 Huh?

[jomaxx]

richmondsteve's saying that it's impossible to say anything useful from the single fact that revenue has dropped.

At the very least you need to be looking at the clickthrough rate and the earnings per click separately. And if the clickthrough rate is the problem, putting in an alternate ad so that the percentage of PSA's being shown can be determined is also important.

[sschlee]

Well, I have little to no PSA's showing. None that I am aware of. The traffic has just been rising as well as impressions and it goes to reason that, at the very least, the money would stay the same, but that's not necessarily the case. Especially not for me and my plans of never having to "work" again thanks to Google AdSense!

Just wanting to know why this is happening without needing to dust off my high school algebra skills.

Maybe this is just a cicular thing.

[ByronM]

i don't know who anyone who can live off $10.00/day :)

BUT, have you tried blocking some of your ads to see if your visitors are just getting sick of the "same old same old"

Sometimes alot of the ads can be redundant and blocking them may help raise your CTR. It can drop your EPC in some respects but improve your CTR and overall earnings if done wisely.

[richmondsteve]

jomaxx, thanks for translating my technical post. ;-) Mario, #3 is to measure what percentage of impressions are actually paying impressions. Google includes (A)lternate (A)d and (P)ublic (S)ervice (A)nnoumcents impressions in their "Impressions" stat. And those same Impressions are the denominator on their CTR stat. For true impressions, true CTR and true effective CPM these impressions must be subtracted out and those stats must be recalculated.

Those publishers who have a very low consistent PSA/AA percentage (or think they do) might not want to bother, but for publishers like me it's critical. My PSA/AA % jumped to an average of 65% for over a week due to trigger words [webmasterworld.com] (thread about my experience). Looking at my Google reports it looked like CTR and CPM fell through the floor, but the true CTR and true CPM were actually normal. And most of the expected revenue I lost was made up for by affiliate revenue through my AAs, but I'll save that for another thread.

If sschlee wants to begin to understand why his/her revenue is down he/she needs to put together some stats, then analyze what they mean.

[markus007]

EPC plunged 50% at midnight and has stayed there all day so far :(