Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Niche site on specific work industry. Kind of an online magazine. 60K Uniques per month and growing each month. Some banner advertising.
September, 2004 -
Began AdSense . Immediately saw the potential and spent weeks reading every AdSense thread on every forum on the Net.
Madly optimized every page whenever not at my "real job." Optimized, analyzed, re-optimized, etc.
December, 2005 -
Reached $2,500.- per month. Most happy.
March 26, 2005 -
Smart Pricing Strikes. EPC plummets. It goes down to less than a dime per click. Fear, desparation, frustration followed by extensive research and emails with G. A good day consists of breaking $30. where, before, a good day was breaking $180.-
Effort, tweaking, adjustments, etc. No change.
April, 2005 -
All but gave up on AdSense. Checked stats twice a week as compared to twice an hour when things were better.
May 7, 2005 -
EPC jumps. Not quite to where I was, but up to twenty to thrity cents per click which is fine for me.
I'm still at a loss for what happened. Could the rebound have been from my tweaking? I suppose, but it is just as possible that my tweaking did nothing.
Lessons learned
1. If you have banner advertisers, don't neglect them. Promise them a lot, and deliver more. They will never disappear all at once while your AdSense Income could.
2. If you don't have banner advertisers, get some. If you have to offer ridiculously low rates to get the program off the ground, do so, but get some. Get a couple so all of your eggs are not in one basket. Banner advertisers are a pain in the but, but they are needed.
3. Phase in multiple streams of income. (Advice I learned here on WW) I brought affiliates back on to my site. While I don't get much from them, at least it is something. I am in the process now of reading and researching how to use them better. (For the life of me I cannot figure out how people make money from Amazon, but I'm working on it)
4. This may be controversial, but my advice on what to do if Smart Pricing slams you is to do nothing. I looked and looked and looked but could not find any magic pill. G offers no advice on how to fix it, and all of the hundreds of posts containing advice are just speculation. Instead, focus on building content. With all of the time you will save by not checking your stats every five minutes, write articles, create directories, build your forum, improve links, etc.
5. Keep telling yourself that Smart Pricing will probably not last forever. If it does, Yahoo and MSN are coming.
That's it. I am not happy or excited about climbing out of the doghouse because I know that it could kick in again tomorrow. PPC advertising will continue to grow, evolve, and improve for good publishers, so there are good times ahead.
If you focus on the money, the money may come. If you focus on the site, the money will come.
Good luck to all my AdSense buddies, and for those who I co-miserated with since March, keep your chins up. If I was able to bounce back, you will too.
Buz
March 26, 2005 -
Smart Pricing Strikes. EPC plummets.
right prior to the date above, did you make any changes to your site?
NO, I didn't make any dramatic changes. I just woke up one day, and the numbers had dropped.
Who knows what causes it?
I'm just pleased that it has passed, for now.
I didn't realise there was a sandbox.
any change, it seems is important to adsense. do you remeber what were the un"dramatic changes"?
