Forum Moderators: martinibuster
For this day (17 May), does it mean that they will pay for April 1-30 earnings, or for May (1-18) also?
On the other hand, the automation attempts weren't able to keep out MFA's, misleading ads, etc..
Apparently they've been good enough to identify targets for the current purge.
Perhaps too many adwords folks are blocking your (crummy) site and therefore you get all the low bidders :)
I do occasionally get arbitrage/MFAers slipping through, and promptly block them. I couldn't say if they were low bidders since the other ads with them are definitely not, and if it happens too much, I reduce the number of ads. My sites are such that 90% of the AdSense ads are ads by the manufacturers of the widgets I write about. The rest are resellers.
When MFAers start slipping through, then either they are bidding high, or targeting is off, or there are reasons why the main advertisers are not bumping them out (end of month, time of year, etc.).
I'm lucky (or unlucky depending on your view, in regards to diversity of ads) that I have a couple of AdSense advertisers who spend the money to remain the top ad or two on every page. I'm not going to say names, but they are top five in their industry, and they apparently consider AS an important enough advertising outlet to pay the money to stay up there.
I'm glad Google is doing this and kicking people out, but I learned long ago that if you are getting lots of Arbitrage/MFAers, drop an AdSense spot or two and replace them with other ad networks or affiliate programs.
I think Google has been trying to automate this process for a long time, to suck the profits out of arbitrage through smart pricing and landing page quality algorithms. The current action suggests that those methods have not been successful, which suggests to me that arbitrage may well continue by directing AdWords traffic to other advertising networks.
If that happens (arbitrage continuing) then they'll probably give AdSense users more tools to deal with the arbitrage sites. What those tools will be, hard to say, or they could change the terms of AW (doubtful).
On the other hand, the automation attempts weren't able to keep out MFA's, misleading ads, etc..
No, and they never will, but as I said, they seem to be continuing to refine it.
No matter what algorithm they come up with to identify such, someone else will eventually come up with some way to get around it. It is ever thus.
If its automated, then scraper sites, pretending to have content, may slip through the net.
Given Matt Cutts' apparent distaste for 'search results in search results' which is what bad scrapers look like, I suspect that G will just deal with scraping as WebSPAM and don't need to shut any accounts. If so then the scrapers will get neither natural traffic nor bought traffic (or will show up on G's radar if they try to monetise any bought traffic), and 'poof' as we say here in France...
Rgds
Damon
[edited by: DamonHD at 7:11 pm (utc) on May 21, 2007]
In defense of the arbs:
-- The biggest advertiser concern in the content network has never been the quality of the site that their ads were on, rather the potential for clickfraud on that site. If someone has a substantial monetary investment in arbitrage marketing, one would think that they would be squeaky clean so they wouldn't be out their AdSense money yet still have to pay the AdWords tab.
-- Even though one arb mentioned running a $20k a month site, someone else referred to that as a profit. Obviously that's not the case, as I'm guessing it would take between $15k to $18k in AdWords overhead to keep it going (unless the profit margins are much fatter than that).
Rather than cast stones, there are lessons to be learned here.
-- Even though one arb mentioned running a $20k a month site, someone else referred to that as a profit. Obviously that's not the case, as I'm guessing it would take between $15k to $18k in AdWords overhead to keep it going (unless the profit margins are much fatter than that).
I made the statement in regards to income. I ran (run) on a spread of between 1:3.5 - 1:5 depending on the day. So in percentage terms average Adwords spend is 25% of gross.
[edited by: Avo19 at 7:30 pm (utc) on May 21, 2007]
The more I read, the less I think this is about me and my sites and more about a huge general June 1. crackdown.
The more I read and think about it I also quite frankly think this is done unfairly perhaps even evil.
Before I begin; I love Google.
I would love to get some philosophers on board to talk about the application of "Don't be evil.", but as a layman I believe that one deserves a "trial" and that a "fair trial" is one that looks at YOU not a huge bundling up of suspects based on new arbitrary arbitrage (excuse pun) interpretations and a canned cold message.
The email from Google does not even address me by name; it just opens "Hello," sent to my email address (that is unique for my AdSense account so I believe it's genuine). It does however claim to be based on “a thorough review of my account by our specialists”. I have asked myself how thorough this review really has been when they did not even find the time to address me by name.
I quite frankly hold Google to a higher standard. And they do so themselves as well (giving the 2 weeks and the cash indicates this), perhaps the AdSense team is just overwhelmed so they turn to drastic measures. I will accept that as a fair answer as I too struggle with these issues as a publisher. I also think the AdSense team did not really think through how hard this would strike at each webmaster.
If this was Microsoft I would expect just this kind of treatment, but from Google I expect a higher standard, that's why I love them, that's why I have invested so much with them. That is why we have all helped Google become the Supreme #1 it has become.
"Don't be evil" applies to all parts of Google, also AdSense – not? Becoming inevitable for webmasters to deal with I believe Google by this the will need to approach the thoroughness and balance of the legal system in its dealings with partners like us.
As webmasters we are totally dependent on fair treatment. I ask each and every one to make up their mind on this issue (from the imperfect information out there) and if this is how they want the system to be. You could be next, for one arbitrary reason or the other – you just won’t know until the email hits you. Sleep tight.
The proper solution to this should be that AdSense came out with much more specific guidelines. Then a specific warning system.
The proper good way to deal with this situation right now I say would be to quickly send a new email and give a statement giving these webmasters some way to clean up their act (give until July 1. can 30 extra days possibly make a huge difference to everyone?). As we speak, right this moment, many webmasters are tearing down years worth of work in desperate measures to save the situation and get to an appeal process with AdSense.
Give us a chance to clean up. Then we can all move forward and build a better system. Thanks.
Anyway, today it's each webmaster for himself. (I can't believe I would ever have to write that line just like that.)
For the record in case I seem a bit harsh: I love you guys at Google, I am among your most loyal evangelists, rain or shine.
[edited by: Avo19 at 7:40 pm (utc) on May 21, 2007]
