April 2018 AdSense Earnings & Observations

[Ironside]

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System: The following 18 messages were cut out of thread at: https://www.webmasterworld.com/google_adsense/4889486.htm [webmasterworld.com] by martinibuster - 6:42 pm on Apr 1, 2018 (utc -5)

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I am up to 14 clicks with a 12p CPC so far today. But it's still early afternoon in the US so hopefully, things will get slightly better. At least marchers earnings were a lot better than January's.

@May Is it possible to work out how many clicks were disabled.

[Mentat]

I need a miracle those last 5 days of April.
April was comparable with February; now let's see the clawback surprise...

[salimkazi7]

After reading about all you guys experience. I will be trying adsense for the first time. Hope it works well for me. May after this post I will be in a better to say something in detail. Thank you guys for sharing your experience

[Jaideemaak]

West Africa and Asia earnings can never be good

My main traffic country is Malaysia and the EPC is abysmal. The Malaysian economy has been in the doldrums for several years now, the Ringgit is very weak, and many Malaysians are struggling financially. Adsense clicks from Malaysia pay a pittance and Malaysians no longer use my hotel affiliates. Going back four years or so, it was a very different story.

Asia is a huge continent and the quote above is something of a generalisation. Clicks from India and Bangladesh don't pay much, but I've had high paying clicks from Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan, which are definitely in Asia. Clicks from Australia also tend to be good, but that is more Asia-Pacific than Asia.

[MayankParmar]

now let's see the clawback surprise...

I'm very scared of clawback :(

And earnings dropped today (Wednesday).

[surfgatinho]

CPC seems to be creeping back up to normal. Still almost 20% down on last years earnings though - and that's with increased traffic...

[MayankParmar]

I haven't received the payment in Bank yet... has anyone ever experienced a delay?

[magician]

I haven't received the payment in Bank yet... has anyone ever experienced a delay?

Many times my bank just sit on the USD payment without converting it to INR. Ask your bank if they've received the payment.

[Ironside]

I got my payment a couple of days ago. I never had any delays in receiving payment from Google which is good.

[Travis]

Tip: Two 300x250 or two 336x280 ad units (one by one) on sidebar performs better than one 300x600.

Thank you @MayankParmar, I'll experiment this. However, isn't it a risk that twice the same ad is being shown, one above each other?

I noticed that over the years, 300x600 (in my case) has seen its performance decreasing. I wonder if advertisers are focusing more on 300x250 and 336x280 creatives, since it's the same kind which are displayed on mobile devices too. So there might be more inventory.

I also see a HUGE decrease of the performance of text ads, anyone else?

[MayankParmar]

@Travis Yes, I've come across same ad on both ad units, and CTR is really low. However, CPC and earning are much better than 300x600

[Travis]

@Travis Yes, I've come across same ad on both ad units, and CTR is really low. However, CPC and earning is much better than 300x600

I wonder if instead of using a generic ad slot for both, it would be better to show one text-only, and one display-only. Like that, even if it' the same advertiser, we would not end with the same image or text showing twice. Or to put one 336x280 ad links, with one display/text ad.

[MayankParmar]

Hmm, sounds good. I'm replacing one sidebar ad with links ad.

[RedBar]

Wow, awesome Thursday G... So far after 15 hours of my Googleday:

1 click
3 Cents
Bangladesh

Plus G, please stop writing to me to advise my earnings are down, I know they are, you've removed my traffic, telling me I'm 35% down on a year ago is nothing, why don't you check my history and tell me that I'm 99.05% down from 6/7 years ago?

[Travis]

RedBar, why are you continuing to use Adsense?

[Ironside]

Not looking too bad today. Only seven clicks so far, but at 23p CPC, not bad for just a few clicks. It's still morning in the US so I've got a long time to go.

[Ironside]

@Redbar you're in the UK aren't you? How come you are getting your earnings in US dollars? Or is that just the conversion rate for the guys on here?

[MayankParmar]

@Travis Probably for additional income.
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Performance is degrading again as the month is coming to an end.

[tryingtogrowsite]

I am appreciative of Adsense it has earned me good money over a period of 9-10 years (though little there last couple of years) but I am preparing a site that I want to rely on not just Adsense but also affiliate income. I am also going to market the site very differently. I want at least 40% repeat and referral traffic, 20% PPC and 40% search. I will be selling my own product as well. It's not a good idea to develop a business in the fickle world that is the internet relying on a single source for both your traffic and income.

On a different note, will 3 ad units on pages that are on average around 1000 words long make people reluctant to link to you?

[MayankParmar]

You should keep at least five ads.

[Travis]

You should keep at least five ads.

hum... I think it really depends of the kind of content you have. In my case, I noticed that two ads are performing better than if I put more.

[Rasputin]

Three is ok on longer articles, I would never have more than that, certainly never more than one visible on any screen, and would only use affiliate links not banners etc.
Also I never have ad at top of screen or ad in sidebar, find they make a page look too cluttered with ads and perform badly as well, but find a link unit right at bottom page can do quite well.
This layout also has a very small clawback (0.1%) and passes the ´user first’ tests.

[MayankParmar]

Imo, the ads in sidebar is less distracting and annoying than ads in between the content.

[Travis]

Hmm, sounds good. I'm replacing one sidebar ad with links ad.

Just checked your site, and I think it looks good like that. I hope it will improve your earnings.

[Ironside]

My top performing ad is a responsive link unit placed just below my horizontal menu just above the page heading of the article. The next best performing ad is a responsive unit placed under the third post on my forum. The third-best performing ad this month is a responsive ad unit placed on the first or second paragraph of text. I also have a 300 x 600 ad unit that brings them a little bit of money each month and that is placed within a paragraph.

My CPC today is at 20p and clicks are rising slowly. Just wish I could get 80-100 clicks like I used to 3 or four years ago. Be lucky if I get 30 clicks a day nowadays. However, I'm still reaching three digits each month so that still pays for the server with a few hundred quid to spare so as long as I'm in profit I might as well keep going.

[MayankParmar]

The performance of link ad is pathetic after the 'Sponsored Links/Searches' label. The "Ads by Google" label was enough :(

[RedBar]

RedBar, why are you continuing to use Adsense?

I just acheived the monthly minimum yesterday and will be removing it from all sites except one from 1st May, to test if anything improves, which is very unlikely with G slashing my USA traffic by up to 50% these past few weeks.

For my global industry Google is well past its sell-by date.

[Travis]

My top performing ad is a responsive link unit placed just below my horizontal menu just above the page heading of the article.

Isn't it against the TOS? Isn't it misleading (the ad links will look like part of your menu).

[tryingtogrowsite]

"You should keep at least five ads."

You have to think about your readers. Do they want to be exposed to so many ads? Also, wouldn't having so many ads theoretically reduce your CPC since lower bided ads will be shown on the page. I am not sure if this how it exactly works but I get the impression, from reading sites on ad optimization, two units seems to be a very good compromise, as it results in more higher paying ads showing and enough exposure to generate decent CTR.

Also, too many ads might put people off from linking to your page. They are less likely to link to what they see as commercially driven. Do you think so?

I have noticed the creative size makes the bulk of my earnings is 300 by 250, followed by rich media. But I don't have a 300 by 250 ad showing at the moment. Does this mean the 320 is the source ad being made responsive on mobile?

[RedBar]

Isn't it against the TOS?

Nope, I had precisely the same approved by Google some what, 12-13 years ago, anyway when AdLinks first came out, and yes, I still have that email ... somewhere!

[Travis]

Nope, I had precisely the same approved by Google some what, 12-13 years ago, anyway when AdLinks first came out, and yes, I still have that email ... somewhere!

Ok, good to know. I guess it's because it needs a second click to earn something. So accidental click on an Ad links should not harm the advertisers.