Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Here's the thing...
For 3 years now I'm working on some projects together with a friend. Since we both put a lot of effort in those sites, we also share the adsense income. Of course we both use the same adsense login to verify our adsense stats.
Now, the problem is, that my friend has no knowledge on php, mysql, seo, google etc. with the result that most of the job is done by myself (he mainly provides new ideas, some content and community members, organization of events etc.). Adsense is split 50%/50% and I have no problem with the fact efforts aren't (see statement above)
Recently I came up with some good ideas of witch I think it's possible to try them alone and of witch I think they're very suitable for adsense. Should I risk it to blindly register for another Ads. account so the income of that project is totally mine? Or should I talk to the Adsense Team about this and try to have their permission?
Regs,
Ash
[edited by: ASchmitt at 11:24 am (utc) on Nov. 27, 2006]
I would think you have a good case for a separate account. Ask them :)
I appreciate that you have had your issues with AS - but I believe there were a number of other factors involved in your suspension.
You and this other person have a way to make money (AdSense) and you need each other's unique contributions to the effort.
Now you've thought of another way to make money with AdSense and decided you don't need the other person's contributions and plan to keep all the income for yourself. Every minute you devote to this new effort is a minute taken away from the original effort.
This sounds like one of the classic business partnership "beginning of the end" scenarios.
FarmBoy
I am a reliable trustworthy guy but I am afraid my partner would decide to be on his own once he found out how to make money through Adsense.
I guess I'll never be a Jerry Yang or Larry Page or the Youtube guys because I don't trust David Filo or Sergey Brin.
:C
I have a project that I've opened up to a few, very carefully chosen friends. Their publisher ID is used on the pages they contribute. Every one of them has other things going on in their lives. Part of the reason that I'm doing this is to encourage them to create their own additional websites.
They could all go ahead and start up a competing site where they put up only their own information, but they all see the value in this collaboration in drawing much more traffic.
ASchmitt also never said that it would be a competing project. Nome of my friend share all my interests. Mikey would be a great choice for working on a site about clamming or crabbing, but there would be no point in including him in a website about wood carving.
farmboy, I think you are assuming too much.
Or maybe not.
Few online sites that are run by friends require all your time.
Time is not the key factor.
ASchmitt also never said that it would be a competing project.
And I never said that ASchmitt said it would be a competing project.
But the first time ASchmitt's business partner thinks their joint project (and his income) is suffering because of ASchmitt's time & energy being devoted to his sole project, he's certainly going to see it as competition.
FarmBoy
he's certainly going to see it as competition.
Only certain if you are his partner.
If I was his partner, I would be encouraging him. Hell, from and SEO perspective, there could be great value to the joint project if his personal projects are successful.
Personally, if any of my partners, in any endeavors of my life, were so selfish they would soon find that they were locked out of all future endeavors. Not even my fiancee would get away with that sort of attitude.
I would even go so far as to volunteer to help my friends set up their own sites, with nothing in it for me.
My partner and I are doing these projects now for some time. All of these projects are communities, with an opensource CMS (phpbb, phpfusion, drupal, ...) For two years now I've been designing layout, programming mod's, implementing a seo strategy, etc. for all those communities.
After 3 years, all of those communities are pretty much able to stand on their own. There's no need anymore for constant modification or implementation of new modules/plugins.
My partner, witch is also one of my closest friends, and I have a monthly meeting discussing the strategy of the next month where we divide the tasks etc. Because of the fact that I'm the only one on our two-person-firm (lol) that knows how to program, design, seo, sea and nurture a community, I've done and still do the main part of the workload. Not that I'm complaining, because... hell, I've studied for it, he didn't... But it's just fun to work together and develop new ideas... (just in between: sometimes somebody with a good idea and no webbuilding skills, is more valuable then a high-level ICT dude with no ideas...)
But... there's one negative point to this kind of coöp... the fact that we both gain income from adsense, demands, in my opinion, that every party putt's equal effort in the revenue-creating projects, based on the numbers of working hours... Because every hour I'm working on our projects, I'm not working for other paying customers, so in the end... I lose money...
Because of the fact that my partner has no ICT knowledge, it's practically impossible for him to invest equal workinghours... So I have nothing to blame for him... but nevertheless... it still feel's strange to share income on that bases...
That's why I want another Adsense account, for my smaller (non-community) projects...
Wheet, I think this is my largest post on WebmasterWorld
no :)
They refer me to the fact that it's possible to track each income for each site separately...
I know this is possible, but this is not what I want...
Why isn't it possible, like in Adwords, to have a Admin account and client accounts?
Secondly - re your relationship with your current business partner. Instead of you having all the work-load, why not teach him some of the knowledge base you have so that you can create a more equal work load? I know a lot of stuff is built up on experience etc, but I'm sure there must be some areas that if you spent a bit of time with him/her you could pass on some of the work and make the relationship more on an equal footing.
Thing like "Previous site was run by us two guys, these new project will be run by a new entity that I will incorporate"
Then send the email again. You will get another pewrson to read it, and the reply might be different.
I know there are cases where double account (personal +company) have been OK-ed. Your case seems pretty similar
The Google people over here are more strict on Google policies I think...
Nevertheless, I will give it a go
Thx for the answers and suggestions...
sometimes somebody with a good idea and no webbuilding skills, is more valuable then a high-level ICT dude with no ideas..
Amen to that! And kudos to both of you if you can make it work.
On the wider issue, there are other ways around this, but it will require co-operation with your partner.
1. You could make the existing account specific to one of you - whichever one the bank account belongs to etc., then the other person could open a second account, using different bank accounts, etc.
2. You could make a formal partnership - a company even, which would hold the account for the joint efforts, allowing you (or both of you) to open individual accounts. It may be the current set up would be best transferred to one of you (depending on banking arrangements), with a new joint account, you want to maximise continuity for Google, but not to break their rules.
May take some juggling of adsense code to make it work, but it would satisfy Google, and could satisfy you.
