May 2015 AdSense Earnings and Observations

[incrediBILL]

Continuation thread from April:
[webmasterworld.com...]

This thread is for discussing AdSense fluctuations only.

This thread is not for discussions of bot blocking, ad placement, reporting to google, or anything other than it's express intended purpose, the fluctuations of adsense.

All other other topics need to be taken to a new thread
Off topic posts may be deleted without notice.

[RedBar]

Pitiful, there's no other way to describe it.

[AlexB77]

Pretty solid here too

[RedBar]

I was wondering why my clicks/earnings were so low today, ad targetting is abysmal, mostly irrelevant to my site, now what have they screwed-up?

[MrSavage]

To borrow from Shark Tank, adsense right now is dead to me. What a ride.

[devGirl]

I've had to augment it with other ad networks since the huge drop on January 1. I've tried a bunch and have now settled on five additional networks, which now are equal or greater to my Adsense earnings. We also use Datonics for remarketing pixel income.

[MrSavage]

Well I hate to go away quietly, but I'm at the point of looking at other ad networks in addition to just adsense. What took me so long? Meh. I have to look at options and I'm not even of the belief that other ads with do anything close. However, when a car breaks down, there are indicators. I just need to have some other options and have less dependence on this right now. For my own sanity I need to do it. It's literally been for the last 2 or 3 days, like 95% of my websites are offline. There are often stretches like this. My one bright light though is approaching a 30 day goal which I've had set for about 2 years now. That makes me feel good and I'm glad it's on a site that I want to move forward with.

[Ebuzz]

@ Mr Savage

Adsense is going the way of the dodo. I've been saying that myself for the past 5 years, and each year, it dies a little. There are people who keep denying that anything's wrong. There are people who say CTR has not changed all this time. But the stats for me say something else. I have a diverse range of sites (some do well, some do poorly), but combined, I can see my CTR dropping steadily within say, a 6 year period. That is a large set of impressions (millions) from a diverse range of sites. It used to be above 1% CTR, and now it is hovering around HALF that. Eventually, the time will come when it will not be viable at least for the small to midrange publishers. EVERYONE will need 2 or 3 times the amount of traffic to make the same return in Adcents.

[Mentat]

CTR is one problem, that it relatively normal to go down (a lot of ad blockers), but what seems to be fishy is the fact that it's not natural that your stable CPC to drop one day by 35-40% and that it's the new normal!

Anyway, my ship is sinking faster now, so let's sing!

In the fist week of May:
- I've lost ranking and -20% of the remaining low traffic from google
- I've lost 35-40% of CPC
- I've lost the Rich Snippets

It's like this "Quality update" to the core algorithm it's integrated with Adsense!

BTW... Since 6th of May, I had -30% traffic from Canada!
Strange...

[Ebuzz]

I think I have strong evidence that something is wrong with the Responsive units.

I have a site that used a normal 300 x 250 unit up till sometime this month. I changed that unit to Responsive, about 10 days ago, So in the same month, I can see the reports of both units. The new Responsive unit is slightly smaller than 300x 250 (maybe 280 x 230), due to my theme. But being responsive, it can fit and adjust into its placement, of which, the location is totally the same. Basically, BOTH are the SAME in size and shape.

However, the new Responsive unit has half the CTR of the old unit. This site is not the one that I was complaining about all along; it is a different one. But today, looking at the reports for both units, it cannot be more obvious. A huge difference in CTR.

Something is really wrong with the Responsive units!

[Mentat]

Why don't you use A/B testing from Adsense for responsive/non-responsive codes?

[Ebuzz]

I am going to do just that. Change the responsive units into 300 x 250 where possible. They are "recommended" by Google for mobile anyway. Until Google fixes all this mysterious (drastic) CTR drops with Responsive units, I will try to lessen their use.

[netmeg]

Last year I ran one responsive unit and two fixed (300 x 250 and 160 x 600 ) and then I switched *all* ad units to responsive in February, and my CTR (which has never been super high) is .1% higher now. Which is pretty much unchanged as far as I'm concerned.

When you change your ad units, are you also changing your placements? Are these on sites that are newly responsive? (This discussion probably should go in another post)

[avalon37]

Looking back over the last 6 months, responsive ads have a slightly higher CTR and RPM on my sites.

[azlinda]

Devastating. Spanish VEHICLE banner ads on an American culinary site. What is Google thinking?

[Mentat]

LOL, URL shortener ads on an automotive site, same banner 3x on the same page, all images!

Sweet!

[azlinda]

@Mentat I get many pages with three of the same AdSense ads. That's one of the reasons why I'm busy replacing most of AdSense. I've found the same ad in a banner, in a 160x600 and a 300x250. What's the point?

[marsradio]

Want to Earn More?
The Answer May Lie Outside of AdSense.

[breeks]

Good day here RPM way up. Turned off ad networks a couple of day ago this might have something to do with improved RPM.

Google certified ad networks are supposed to compete with bottom feeder ads and increase RPM (per Google Rep) however the last thing most publishers need these days is more bottom feeder ads.

[Whatagreatdayitis]

Are earnings delayed for Adsense today? I'm down by about half compared to last week. Media.net hasn't reported estimated earnings from yesterday. My Adwords account is slow, too. It couldn't be an affect from the Memorial Day holiday, it's too soon.

[eeek]

Pitiful, there's no other way to describe it.

There is another way: broken! Targeting is pathetic at best.

[MrSavage]

Today made me happy in more than one way!

[Mentat]

3 days long weekend in US? ;)

[AlexB77]

Not sure about US but UK yes including Bank Holiday Monday

[Mentat]

In US, Monday is Memorial Day

Memorial Day is a federal holiday. All non-essential Government offices are closed, as are schools, businesses and other organizations. Most public transit systems do not run on their regular schedule. Many people see Memorial Day weekend as an opportunity to go on a short vacation or visit family or friends. This can cause some congestion on highways and at airports.

[Ebuzz]

Well, whatever holidays going on, doesn't make a difference at all to me, in light of the decline of Adsense (my traffic increases during holidays). This May has to be the worst month in many years for me, as I am sure for many others. There is nothing wrong with my pageviews, but something is seriously wrong with the CTR for me (CPC for some others). I suspect the ads and the targeting are just - screwed up (for want of.....a better word).

[trebuchet]

Stats have not moved at all for a couple of hours now.

[IanTurner]

Seeing the same here trebuchet - has been from midnight US West Coast time - now getting on for three hours - I'd guess some server maintenance going on.

[RedBar]

What a disastrous Friday for me.

The good news, my CPC was fine and that's about it.

One of my lowest PVs of the year with my second-lowest earnings' day but to cap it all off easily my lowest Clicks of the year at 34%, I have never, ever been in this territory which is removal level time because today so far, according to Google, I have had 6 PVs in the first two hours.

[Sillysoft]

I really believe memorial day weekend affected my earnings yesterday. I had one site with a lot of clicks like normal, but only was getting 20-30 cents a click where for almost a whole year I was averaging 60-80 cents a click. Going to be a long 3 day weekend for my earnings. But that usually means a burst of earnings/traffic come Tuesday. Crossing fingers!

[trebuchet]

I had very low US PVs for Friday. I can only assume that a lot of people were travelling or making plans for the long weekend. Headed into the summer slowdown for my sites but at least I know that's coming.