Adsense + Infolinks (or another in-text ads)

in a small but content rich website visited by Canadians

[LilyTousi]

I have more than 40 websites, all with Adsense ads, but in one of my smaller site I would like to test Infolinks (or another in-text ads program) along with Adsense. I’m just curious to see if the total income may increase. Here’s an overview of the website I want to use to make this test:

Subject: Info site about a Caribbean destination, very rich in content
Page views per month: ~ 45 000
Unique visitors per month: ~ 7800
Visitors coming from: Canada 90%, UK 3%, USA 2%, others 5%

Any suggestion or feedback or how well infolinks may perform on this particular type/size of website? Or maybe another type of in-text ppc advertising would be better? I read good reviews about Vibrant but even my biggest website doesn’t have the required traffic.

[JCKline]

The only way to know for sure is to test it...so test it.

[ember]

We use Kontera on one site and it generates about 1.5% of what Adsense does.

[ken_b]

I use Kontera on my site. It's about 10 - 15% of AdSense.

I haven't been able to spot any indication that Kontera is taking clicks away from AdSense though, so it's a little bit of extra money.

[azn romeo 4u]

Infolinks has gone downhill for well over a year now.

[CMidd]

Infolink and Kontera both suck, get Virbrant media. it averages about 1/10 of my Adsense earning, but doesn't affect my ad sense earning at all.

[Lame_Wolf]

Personally, I wouldn't use in-text adverts. I never have, nor ever will click on them. I think they make a site look spammy, rarely the correct words are linked, and IMO annoys the user.

[Kontera]

Hi Lily,

This is Jonathan from Kontera, you might want to give our in-content ads a try. Building on what ken_b was saying Kontera doesn't interfere with AdSense, and only ads to your overall revenue. That's because Kontera is displayed in a completely different area of the webpage.

Additionally, speaking to Lame_ Wolf's concern, Kontera's Synapse Platform, enables us to understand an article for actually meaning, rather than just using keyword lists as with other ad providers. This added understanding of your content, allows us to display more relevant ads, leading to higher CTR and better CPC.

We also feature an exclusive ad inventory from some of the biggest brands in the world, and are especially strong with Lifestyle sites, including Travel sites like your own :)

[Swanny007]

I was with Kontera for a few years until last year. I'm glad I left as Vibrant pays more in my niche. I've seen no decrease in AdSense revenue either.

Lame_Wolf, I used to think like that too. Then I decided to treat my sites like a business, which they are. To me it makes sense to monetize while the money is on the table. I don't think I've had a single user complain about the links. Mind you, when someone is registered and logged in, I remove those ads. Only guests who don't contribute or sign up get to see the ads.

[atladsenser]

I've been using Kontera for over a year now consistently, and I'm very happy with the results. In my best months, they approach 15 to 20 percent of my Adsense earnings; some months are slow, but there are enough good months during the year with Kontera to make it worth my while, without question.

I've also experimented with Vibrant. Some publishers report great earnings with them; for me, that just wasn't the case. I tried them for a few months earlier this year, and it just didn't perform well for me. I'm sure it's because of the topic niche I'm in -- Kontera's just better for that, for me at least.

[jinxed]

Kontera, you should have a look at your signup page.

I thought I’d take a look and sign up - only to be told 15+ times that the character code I am entering did not match the verification image. My eye sight must be worse than I first thought.

[Kontera]

If you're having problems with the verification image, and it does happen a small percentage of the time, you can e-mail me at jonathanc (at) kontera (dot) com and we can manually create your account.

[LilyTousi]

Thank you all for your feedback!
Since my website doesn't qualify to join Vibrant (not enough monthly page impressions), I finally decided to go with KONTERA on one of my websites to make a test for a few months. After signing up I didn't receive the verification email, I wrote to Support... waiting for their reply.

[CMidd]

LilyTousi

You site qualifies for virbrant!

45,000 page views is more then enough. contact Virbrant support and they will let you in.

Trust me, you will love virbrant payout over infolink or kontera.

I'm talking the different between

Adsense = $24.00

Infolinks = $.47 cents a day
Kontera = $.03 cents a day
Vibrant = $1.87 a day

on a site doing around 2,000 impression (400 visitor)

[LilyTousi]

CMidd,
I read in the Vibrant website that it takes a minimum of 500,000 monthly impressions to qualify, but maybe it's only for their Vibrant InterestAD Program? I didn't realize that the Vibrant In-Text Program doesn't require a minimum amount of monthly impressions. If it's the case then I'll certainly test Vibrant in one of my website.

[nomis5]

I'd go for Vibrant Media as well, the best of the bunch by far.

They do have a minimum traffic level but as far as I understand it's applied on a site by site basis.

[CMidd]

LilyTousi

I think Virbant just say that to keep the newbies out. I have virbrant on website doing less then 3,000 impressions a month. And when i first signed up I was doing less then 100,000 impressions a month.

Just sign up and test out all 3

I personally tested all three "well actually 4"

I test Adbrite text link "worst"
I tested Kontera "full of spam"
I test infolink "full of MFA Sites and low rate search engines and the pay is horrible. I'm talking 5 clicks for a penny, and the ad would just pop up on their own with videos playing with out a user needing to click them. Stay away from infolink"

Then i finally tried Virbrant and haven't looked back since.

but each site is different, try them all.

[SilverSpirit]

I test Adbrite text link "worst"
I tested Kontera "full of spam"
I test infolink "full of MFA Sites and low rate search engines and the pay is horrible.

This is my experience too.

[Swanny007]

My experience of the ones I've used:

InfoLinks: Worst of the worst, horrible
Kontera: Used to be decent, but I wouldn't use them now
Vibrant: Best right now, most $, good ads from what I've seen

[nomis5]

Agreed, Vibrant is the best of the intext. And yes, get a grip on financial reality, if intext ads pay then use them.

I have recently tried out a new alternative to Adsense ads and it's looking very good. It's Criteo and best to visit their site (just Google criteo) to get the full story. But in essence they guarantee to buy ad space off you at an eCPM greater than Adsense pays. It's an absolute doddle to implement the code and ..... it works! They don't replace all your Adsense, they only take the slots they want - on my site that equates to about 26% of the ads at the moment. To date their is no adverse effect on Adsense income, maybe even there is an increase due to the competition for the same ad slots but that is early days.

The eCPM starts low, they have a program that organises the buying of the ad slots, but it slowly works up the eCPM over 10 days or so. So far it seems to work. It's a no loose alternative to Adsense because there is no lock-in period, if you don't like the results just remove their code.

They were the biggest European start-up a year or two ago and have millions of £ behind them.

With Vibrant as an alternative and now Criteo, for my main site, I feel a bit more secure against the monopoly that Adsense is for some others.

[londrum]

its funny you should mention criteo because i was just looking at them today. the only reason i noticed them is because they seem to have interest-based ads, just like google.

i visited a site, and then another one, and the ads on the second site were promoting the first one -- the exact same site. so i assumed that they were adsense interest-based ads, but when i looked they were criteo.

[nomis5]

londrum, they are interest based ads of a kind. They only display ads if the viewer has previously been to a site they have an interest in. That's one reason why they can produce higher eCPM compared to Adsense.

When you look at their proposition it's a no loose situation with a high potential of gaining.

[londrum]

the ads i saw were good ads that i've never seen displayed through adsense. and i would love to have them on my site. that is why i stopped and took an interest in them.
but is it all cost per impression stuff? do they not offer cost per click as well?

[ken_b]

but is it all cost per impression stuff?

Anyone have an idea what the CPMs are?

Over $5.00?

[snickles121]

Im seriously thinking about trying in text ads again, since ctr is so bad lately. I wonder how Panda feels about them. Anyone recently tried using these and did your rankings change?

I also agree that a website does need to be treated like a business. Its good to think about the user, but if I loose my shirt it wont make much of a difference anyways.

[farmboy]

This added understanding of your content, allows us to display more relevant ads, leading to higher CTR and better CPC.

Sounds like putting content based ads on the same page as AdSense?


FarmBoy

[netmeg]

That's allowed, as long as they don't look like AdSense.

[jpch]

Anyone have an idea what the CPMs are?

I was at a little over $3.00 in November but only getting a 10% fill rate at that level. I replaced them but am considering using them again to see if they can deliver a better fill rate.

To date their is no adverse effect on Adsense income, maybe even there is an increase due to the competition for the same ad slots but that is early days.

Criteo doesn't bid against AdSense...they take impressions away from AdSense or whatever other ad you're showing. You can put AdSense as the backup Tag for Criteo. If you look under Ad Networks in Performance reports you might find that Criteo is already bidding on ads on your site thru AdSense.

[atladsenser]

You guys have all made some great points about Kontera, Infolinks and Vibrant. It sounds like for most publishers on this form, Vibrant has been a better-performing ad network than the other two. For me, that wasn't the case, but it sounds like for you guys, it has been the case.

Still, the info we have mostly is very subjective, so I thought it might be helpful to list the strengths and weaknesses of Kontera and Vibrant, the two link/in-text ad networks I've tried (I've never tried Infolinks, so I don't know how they are). So here goes:

Pro's for Vibrant:
- It's the AdSense of the in-text ad networks, or so it seems; they're the largest and they seem to work with the largest/big-brand publishers (MSNBC.com, Foxnews.com, etc.)
- Their in-text links offer a wider range of ad styles & sizes than Kontera's, at least in my experience
- Their in-text links are clearly visible as a distinct color from your site's normal web links, so if you're concerned about user experience, their links (which are green) should be clearly identifiable as ads

Cons for Vibrant:
- If your site is not in the news or travel category, you're probably out of luck; their ads seem geared overwhelmingly toward these advertisers
- You can't change the color of the ads to match your site's link colors, so your CTR is likely to be low
- Responsiveness of customer/publisher service is nearly nonexistent
- Vibrant's ads don't seem to conform to each site's target content/audience; it appears that they highlight the words & phrases their advertisers want to target. If your site doesn't contain these phrases frequently or prominently -- and there's no way for you to know or find out what they are -- you're out of luck.

Pro's for Kontera:
- Though not as big a player as Vibrant, they're still a large ad network with lots of advertisers
- You have much more flexibility and ability to customize with Kontera -- you can change the link color, the number of links that are highlighted on your site's pages, and choose sections of the page in which you want Kontera ads to appear (and not appear)
- Publisher/customer service is very responsive, at least in my experience
- Kontera seems to gear its algorithms toward finding the terms that match the content/target audience of your site most closely, and then matching up ads with those words & phrases.

Cons for Kontera:
- Some times of the year can be very slow, and thus have lots of low-earnings days in a row (sometimes a whole month or more). This can test your patience, believe me.
- They can get smaller and less well-known advertisers sometimes, which can seem spammy or not relevant.

Those are the main points I can think of. Overall for me, Kontera has been a great addition. I'd suggest trying them both, and seeing what works for you.

[nomis5]

Cons for Vibrant:
- If your site is not in the news or travel category, you're probably out of luck; their ads seem geared overwhelmingly toward these advertisers

I don't know how many categories Vibrant are good for, but I absolutely know that the two categories you mention are not the only ones that they perform well in. Cooking and lifestyle sites are in my area and they are doing very, very well with Vibrant. At times, Vibrant are out performing Adsense, not overall, but it's becoming very, very close now for my sites.

Gardening websites, from the knowledge I have from previously owned websites, also perfom well with Vibrant.