Forum Moderators: martinibuster
[adsense.blogspot.com...]
There's a lot of different calculations that go into the value of a click - for example, did you know that the highest paying ad is usually the first one that loads on the page? and that subsequent ads usually pay less. By the time you get down to the bottom of the page, that's probably where your penny ads are; if you have more than one ad block, you might try taking it down to one to see if that helps.
Some sites just naturally attract better ads. Do you feel your ads are pretty targeted to your traffic? Are you catching them when they're in a buying mode/cycle? If not, that could have something to do with it. Some of my sites are entertainment sites - people flock to them, but they don't click much, and when they do, the clicks don't pay all that much - because people aren't really focused on *buying* stuff. Once I figured that out (and it took a while) then I could work on other sites to try to catch people at the right time in that cycle (and I still don't have it completely right)
I have two ad blocks on the page, each in their separate Ad Unit, so I can track the effectiveness of each. The one towards the top gets clicked much more than the one towards the bottom, but the one towards the bottom sometimes pays 5 or 6 times as much (other days, like today for example, that block has 2 clicks paying a total of 5 cents).
I realize that sites that don't convert well might get "smart priced" .. and that makes sense. But the problem is, what happens when the ad is for a product, say, Florida Orange Juice.. where obviously, nobody is going to buy that over the internet anyway. I assume the goal of that type of ad is more as a product reminder, not necessarily for online conversion..
(As an advertiser, I sure don't pay the same for branding campaigns as I do for an ecommerce site)
If your traffic has moved mostly offshore, I could see where that's possibly a factor too. I have no idea if Google has a quality score for traffic (Yahoo does) but it would stand to reason that if they see a lot of invalid clicks from one area, or just plain see a lot of clicks from a region that isn't likely to convert at all, they'd discount the value of the clicks. One of my sites targets Michigan; if 30% of my traffic came from Asia or Europe, it probably wouldn't be very lucrative.
Only with a huge day of traffic and clicks can you break through the ceiling.
But the problem is, what happens when the ad is for a product, say, Florida Orange Juice.. where obviously, nobody is going to buy that over the internet anyway.
According to Google, CPM (cost per 1,000 impressions) ads --which is what branding ads tend to be--are served only when, in Google's estimation, they're likely to pay better than CPC (cost per click) ads. So, if you're seeing ads for Florida orange juice, it's likely to be for one of two reasons:
- Higher-bid CPC ads aren't available for your page(s) at that given point in time, and/or...
- Those higher-bid CPC ads tend not to perform well on your page (in other words, not enough readers are clicking on those ads).
But that's just a detail, and it may not be the reason why you're getting clicks that earn only a few pennies each. Chances are, you won't be able to identify the reason, and if you're getting only 40 to 60 clicks a day, it may be more productive to build out your site and increase you audience than to worry about questions that have no readily-available answers. Ultimately, high-quality traffic (and plenty of it) is what brings in revenue, whether that revenue is from AdSense or other sources.
One of my sites seems to convert well for advertisers..what with they writing to thanking me for the content, offering affiliate programs to subscribe to etc. The EPC is quite high. I am currently blending some aff. links with the content to try and take advantage of the traffic.
Why don't you add some aff. links? This will give you a very good idea about the worth of your site and how advertisers may perceive your site traffic.
