Forum Moderators: martinibuster
I finally had time to check out the Jan/Feb issue of eContent magazine (a printed trade publication) and there was an interview with Steve Zucker of PetPlace, as well as Kurt Ambrahamson, Google's director of content media. PetPlace definitely reveals some stats (I would assume they have Google's A-OK to reveal them, since they are a case study).
Some of the more interesting points the article makes, and ones that we don't often see the hard facts on, because it is a TOS violation issue:
The full article:
Content Goes Googling for Dollars [econtentmag.com]
JAG
The numbers don't seem to add up. I calculate per click amount of at least $6.00 which is extremely high for the ads that are being shown.
My math is different: 4 million pageviews / adsense in half of tem = 2 million pagevies
Using 2.7% CTR {low end} = 54,000 clicks
October revenue $11,000
$11,000 / 54,000 clicks = $0.204 EPC
Makes sense ;)
I love being able to be bad without breaking the TOS
JAG
Can anyone redirect 1.9 million pageviews my way?
I've always wondered how websites reach that "next level" of pageviews.
Those sure are some nice numbers to shoot for.
<snip>
[edited by: Jenstar at 9:21 pm (utc) on Mar. 10, 2004]
[edit reason] Off-topic [/edit]
They sure have a high CTR for Adsense skyscrapers UNDER the fold, on the right side.
Not really. It's been my experience that it is on par. They have content that's why. When people are interested in the content they read on and look around later so it works better towards the end of the content. If the content is uninteresting or the content owner is looking for the quick click then the ads work best on the top. It's because it's not worth the time for the surfer to hang around and the content owner doesn't really care if they do anyway.
JAG
6 days period:__250 $/day - 11.4 cent - 13.9 cent
September:____287 $/day - 13.0 cent - 15.9 cent
October:______355 $/day - 16.1 cent - 19.7 cent
For smaller sites, it can be hundreds of dollars a month; for larger ones, it can be hundreds of thousands of dollars
<yawn>
All the other figures are interesting and a lot of webmasters will be comparing them with their own figures but saying that it can be hundreds of dollars a month or even hundreds of thousands doesn't say anything except that he has omitted to mention that some sites may make only $10 per month. Also, some sites could have CTR as low as 0.1% and some could have 20%+, the EPC could be lower than the 11-19 cents suggested... or in excess of $1.00.
Google choose the example carefully in that it demonstrates that you don't need to be in the s*x or penile extension businesses to rake in money via Adsense. And it's all carefully worded to suggest you don't need to do much to "rake it in"... "Zucker spends about an hour a day "... read the article again but this time with a cynical eye, it sounds like a press release.
I have some problems with the figures. I can't see how petplace.com gets even 200K visitors a month. It would have to be a mega sticky site to achieve 4 million page views. Alexa puts their rank at just under 50K with average page views of about 2, metricsmarket.com puts their traffic at circa 169K. Neither of those are infallible but, together with other indicators, they suggest traffic of a much lower magnitude.
Anyway, lots of us it provided a nice exercise using either calc.exe or pen & paper to make some calculations. For me it shortened the commute home.
I have the same problem. Also the backlinks they have are not so high to get 4.000.000 pageviews a month.
Also the backlinks they have are not so high
Maybe they are confusing "hits" with page views ;-)
Maybe they are getting 4 millions "hits". They get traffic not just from linkbacks of course, they get traffic from search engines too but they don't seem to do that well in SEs. They come up #5 in Google for Pet place :-)
Leaves me wondering about the accuracy of some of those other figures. I've been doing some research - the EPC is possible for the type of ads they attract. The CTR is not impossible. But if the impressions are widely off track then the very juicy earnings that the article reports are probably widely off track too.
All we have is a third parties' hearsay, a third party that does not have any involvement or incentive to check the accuracy of the figures.
I have some problems with the figures. I can't see how petplace.com gets even 200K visitors a month. It would have to be a mega sticky site to achieve 4 million page views. Alexa puts their rank at just under 50K with average page views of about 2, metricsmarket.com puts their traffic at circa 169K. Neither of those are infallible but, together with other indicators, they suggest traffic of a much lower magnitude.
I was going to put this in my first post, but I was afraid Alexa wouldn't be a good indicator - but hey it's an indicator nonetheless.
My site is currently 19,000 in Alexa and I don't get 3,000,000 page views a month. Perhaps the other poster is right when thinking it may be hits, not pages served...
Bad measuring stick, but it is one of the few we got.
I was doing some pet specific searches about a month ago, and PetPlace did keep coming up, so they are/were doing well for specific pet article keywords.
The PR gain from being featured on Google must be phenomenal! They even got a link from a WW thread to boost their PR and get visitors like me who'd never otherwise go there ;-)
Trafficranking.com is a bit more generous to them @ 8939 page views per day so approx 260K page views per month (with about 144,780 visitors per month). I would consider it a catastrophy if I dropped from 4 million pages to a quarter million. In fact if they did have that big a drop in traffic it would cause so great a drop in revenue that their business model may not be sustainable anymore and they would be in the process of closing shop. Nah... I don't think they got burned. I think the original figures are dodgy.
password-protected members pages
some of their content might be distributed to partners that they count as pageviews
They could be picking up pageviews in places not seen by Alexa or other rating services
figment88, if over 90% of their page views (3.75 million/4 million) were *hidden* pages surely it would have been mentioned somewhere, either in the original Google article or in subsequent ones? In fact, if that was the case it's highly unlikely Google would have chosen to use them as a "typical" example, IMHO.
PS: I have included in my calculations all the subdomains they use.
You can add [petplace.aol.com...] to the list.
Chndru: Nice catch!
I agree. And those sites could add substantially to the traffic figures already estimated.
<admiring even more how crafty Google was in their choice of site to make an example of>
[edited by: Macro at 7:47 pm (utc) on Mar. 11, 2004]
My site is currently 19,000 in Alexa and I don't get 3,000,000 page views a month.
We're around 40,000 and get 7,500,000 page vies a month (around 13M hits). Of course, I don't have the toolbar installed on my computer which would make a big difference ;).
Metricsmarket puts petplace.com at about 168,000 user sessions, nothing very high. Our 7.5M page view site is just over 180,000 user sessions.
CF
My site is currently 19,000 in Alexa and I don't get 3,000,000 page views a month.We're around 40,000 and get 7,500,000 page vies a month (around 13M hits). Of course, I don't have the toolbar installed on my computer which would make a big difference ;).
Metricsmarket puts petplace.com at about 168,000 user sessions, nothing very high. Our 7.5M page view site is just over 180,000 user sessions.
Metricsmarket puts my 19,000 Alexa, 750,000 page views, PR7 website at 325,100 user sessions.
I'd love to have enough cash ($11,000/month would suffice) to buy a report from a company like Hitwise to have a big fish eye view of my niche area...
Now this is getting OT, so I will close the case here...
