March 2012 AdSense Earnings & Observations

[HuskyPup]

Well, my February was all over the place, very similar to The Himalayas in profile!

[seoholic]

CTR is 50% down because of mayor AdSense bugs.

Some adunits just do not appear. I have many pageimpressions with 0 instead of 3 adunits. This does not seem to be an error on our site because it`s random and reloading the page a few times makes some adunits reappear.

Is anyone else seeing this behaviour?

[zarathustra2011]

I don't want to jump the gun, but my good day bad day pattern is continuing in splendid form. A lot high paying clicks from the USA yesterday, today I'm getting very few from anywhere.

Out of curiosity how many of you use the 'Sites authorized to show ads' feature. I did try adding it for the first time yesterday, and included all my websites. This morning it came up with some suggestions for google.co.uk google india etc. etc. and bing, along with various image searches, which I then added to my list. Not sure whether this has currently had an impact on today.
I usually have a very steady amount of traffic and clicks daily, so I'm thinking I might only use this option should something irregular pop up.

[netmeg]

I don't use it.

[zarathustra2011]

Thanks Netmeg - I'm thinking I'll probably remove it today.

[JCKline]

All seems to be getting worse. Bleak week...month.

[NomadMan]

Started a few weeks ago with the Authorized sites after I trapped referral traffic from dubious sites with frames and such.

The first weeks i had this notification 24/7 all day long:

"Your ads have recently appeared on websites you haven't authorised. To avoid lost revenue, make sure that you authorise any sites where you display ads by visiting your account settings."

After I authorized sites, it kept on appearing, although the list of non-authorised sites was empty. Seems like some sort of Adsense side-effect.

[Play_Bach]

> All seems to be getting worse. Bleak week...month.

Year :-|

[zarathustra2011]

NomadMan - I've taken it off now, but the message keeps appearing at the top. I guess it might take 48 hours to disappear. I'm glad that Googleplus message has gone away at least!
Until I tried the option for authorizing sites, I really hadn't thought about all the sites with frames that are displaying other people's website content. I certainly don't mind the image searches as that seems to bring in a healthy amount of traffic, but I'll be keeping an eye out for anything dubious from now on.

[NomadMan]

For me there's no other choice than using the Authorized sites feature - not in the position to track my sites on a daily basis.

[JCKline]

Is it "deja vu" or is today looking as bad as yesterday?

[incrediBILL]

Don't worry, tomorrow will be worse and the day after a complete disaster.

[JCKline]

incrediBILL, today is a complete disaster. Are you saying tomorrow I will begin to owe Google money? Oh man...:(

[adamxcl]

This is the worst I have ever seen it. Adsense is getting close to being worthless. I may as well get some bottles, some ice, a cold glass, take Adsense off my site and let users have a better experience on a faster site with less crap on it.

[Play_Bach]

Yesterday earnings closed at just about 60% of average. This at least was up from the two dismal days before which, no matter how hard I try to understand, have numbers that escape all logic. I too suspect big changes going on within the AdSense program.

Perhaps it's new software being installed that's causing the wide swings in stats and earnings? That would at least make some sense. Having been with the program since 2004, I can say I've never seen my stats so inconsistent. Looking forward to when the dust settles!

[JCKline]

It happened. Yesterday's earnings where so below par, I believe I owe Google money now. Just awful!

[Slashus]

@Play_BacH: These crazy swings started early October for me. And the more I read, a lot of other people as well around the same time. Up until then, despite Panda hitting me - ecpm was inline and relatively consistent across 50+ websites for over 4 years.

But then whatever they did in October threw any consistency out the window. My ecpm has dropped by $6 on a monthly average with wild fluctuations throughout the month.

I've come to the conclusion that AdSense requires a different strategy now (at least with my sites) and that I should get used to the new way AdSense performs for us publishers or I'll give myself a heart attack. I think I have to re-read, "Who Moved My Cheese" again.

So in otherwords: Add more content = Add more traffic = More gross revenue albeit at a lower ecpm. Whatever. There's more than one way to skin a cat as they say.

[ElvisFan]

How ad per page do you have? I started with the recommended 3 ads! Last month deleted page to only 2 ads... Now on most pages just one header ad. It seems a little better but nothing to write mother home about...

[zarathustra2011]

I've had consistency for months and months now, but this latter part of March is all over the place.
I'm revamping my website soon, though nothing majorly drastic and hope it may improve things, though I remain skeptical.
I discovered a poorly made website that is ranked extremely highly on google, and the majority of it's content is frames displaying hundreds of websites on an art based theme, including my own. I'm gutted that such a poorly designed site can get so much traffic (and it's built around Google Adsense, so I'm sure it's making a pretty penny), but at the same time, it links to just about everyone of my pages and brings me quite good traffic. It's a double edged sword.

[freelanceit]

My total revenue for yesterday was 18 pence. I'm still trying to find something to spend the money on. Todays stats are stuck with my current revenue at 5 pence. Lord only knows what I am going to buy with that:-)
Things are so bad that instead of exceeding the minimum payment every month it now takes me two to three months to even attain the minimum monthly pay out. Strangely I am doing better with Kontera than Google at present. However I notice that Kontera ads are now sporting the 'ad-choices' banner so it makes me wonder whether Google have a finger in the Kontera pie too.

[Play_Bach]

Another disappointing AdSense day. :-(

[IanCP]

I'm sure I said this before [more or less] what I now find very worrisome, is the preponderance of negative comments here.

Going back years ago, we had folks who were experiencing down, balanced against by people who had ups.

As one would imagine.

This thread seems to have now become about the negatives. Doom and Gloom.

My view has always been, if I'm down, then naturally someone else is upward in balance. They might have much better sites.

This thread seems to be all about negatives. [I'm also affected] and the even more negatives.

The question now needs to be asked:

"Is there now exposed a fundamental flaw in AdSense, having reached its "ZENITH" or saturation on the internet, we all now share minus .00001% of the pie?"

What I personally find worrisome is the absence of folks here saying [from olden days]:

"Hey, I'm going 'gang-busters', what's your worry"

Opinions of respected, professional web designers such as, among a great many others, "Netmeg" could be of assistance.

[Spyder_Cat]

My traffic is at a record high whilst ecpm has taken a noticeable hit. I do not know if this is a temporary thing or if this is how it will be from now on. If the latter I will have to reassess how I monetize my site and how I spend my time.

[NomadMan]

Since the Feb Panda update i've seen traffic go up (10-20%) and spikes in Adsense revenue against a steady backdrop of traffic since the first Panda update.

[IanCP]

SEE!

Winners come out of the woodwork.

It's not all doom and gloom.

[jpch]

"Hey, I'm going 'gang-busters', what's your worry"

Opinions of respected, professional web designers such as, among a great many others, "Netmeg" could be of assistance.

I'm going Gang Busters and have been for the last several months. I usually don't post on this thread even though I read it because it seems kind of pointless to complain about daily earnings fluctuations. Mine sometimes vary by 10% to 15% per day but overall have been very steady and increasing. Yesterday was the best Saturday I've had in quite awhile.

As far as being a respected, professional web developer...well, let's just say I'm not and that's the funny part about my story...which I hope to tell one day after I've paid my house off and built my savings up.

[AnAppleADay]

Will be interesting to know where the winners come from and how long they are in buisiness. I know just from webmasters with long adsense history that they got doomed. If I come from high $nnnn.nn and see actualy low $nnnn.nn it's harder than to come from $nn.nn to go to $nnn.nn. First one will lose maybe everything. Second one get an beer extra.

[ken_b]

I've been beaten to a pulp by an angry Panda, but AdSense has stepped up to the plate and done what it could to heal my wounds! :)

Of course I'm a hobbyist, and not a

... respected, professional ...

so I'll just sit here in the corner quietly counting my stash of quarters :)

.

[zarathustra2011]

This past week I've had a 20% drop in traffic and a 30% loss in earnings. I can't work out where the drop's occurred, but it's having a big impact. My traffic levels are now the same as this time last year, but I was certainly earning more a year ago. Am hoping it picks up, as the past 5-6 months had been very encouraging.

[Play_Bach]

@zarathustra2011
Sorry to hear it. No rhyme or reason to what is going with AdSense as far as my account is concerned, hopefully yours will rebound. For example, today I have had only a handful of clicks recorded yet earnings are over double what they were yesterday (which unfortunately, is still lousy by comparison to the same time in 2009). Long gone are the days when my AdSense stats seemed to make sense.

[zarathustra2011]

Thanks Play_Bach. I've looked at Google Analytics, and the drop in traffic comes from Google, though under 'keyword (not provided)', so doesn't help me much.
Here's to hoping for future consistency, and increased earnings for one and all. :)