Make Money with Google Adsense!
Top Paying Keywords! $100 per click! You have seen these headlines, right?
Are they real? Can one person clicking on you Adsense links really earn you a $100? Maybe, maybe not.
Although Google Adsense and pay per click marketing through their Adsense adverts has become an essential part of most websites today.
In fact, Google Adsense has revolutionized the pay per click market by using an innovative approach to advertising.
There is no doubt that the Google Adsense program is one of the most successful affiliate marketing programs ever created, but can clicks on your Adsense links really earn you money? Yes, webmasters are making money with Google Adsense but how much, and how are they doing it is the real question.
In the early days of the Internet, website publishers earned income through selling advertising banner space on their sites. Usually these banners would be designed to catch the eye of the consumer in an attempt to get them to click on it. The website would then receive a tiny profit from the click through.
This was the standard way of generating advertising income until Google came up with Google Adsense.
Ironically, today the main challenge currently facing the affiliate solution providers is the competition from [pay per click] PPC search engine marketing.
You simply sign-up to use the [pay per click] PPC service and then, upon approval, you are able to choose the style of adverts to place on your website. This can be in the form of traditional banner ads or text links, in a variety of shapes and sizes. You also have the ability to manipulate the foreground and background colours of the PPC advertisements, allowing them to be blended into your sites style.
Each advert you publish on your site has your own unique publisher id, allowing click throughs to be credited to your PPC account.
So, what does Google Adsense actually do?
Google Adsense is a program in which you get paid for targeting your readers to another websites product or service.
A click through is measured when someone actually clicks on the hyperlink. A great many web sites now have Google Adsense ads employed. Google Adsense uses Google AdWords content and services in a display box that you place strategically on your website. Google AdWords customers pay Google a determined amount of money to place their ads. Google passes on around 60% of this value to Adsense users whenever an ad is clicked on.
Since the popularity of Google has risen to such prominence, Adsense affiliates can make a good living, if they can deploy the Google Adsense box effectively on their website. In fact more and more webmasters are making credible PPC incomes through Google Adsense alone on their sites. In short, the greatest thing with Google Adsense is that you don't have to sell a thing.
Google pays you every time someone clicks on the adverts that they place on your site. Google Adsense is easy to learn and it's possible to make anywhere from a few dollars to several hundred per day just by using little known techniques.
Whenever the Google Adsense ads on your sites are clicked, the amount you get paid will vary, sometimes greatly. The amount you receive depends on topic of the ads and how much webmasters are willing to pay to receive the clicks.
Let's say you have a goal of earning $100,000 a year from Google Adsense. Is that possible ? Let's see ... $100,000 divided by 365 = $274 a day. So your goal is to produce either:
- 274 pages which earn $1 a day OR
- 548 pages which earn 50 cents a day OR
- 1096 pages which earn 25 cents a day
Let's presume that you want to earn $1 a day per page.. for which you need per page
- 400 visitors, 5% click-through rate (CTR) and average 5c payout, OR
- 200 visitors, 10% CTR and an average 5c payout, OR
- 100 visitors, 10% CTR, and an average 10c payout, OR
- 100 visitors, 5% CTR, and an average 20c payout, OR
- 50 visitors, 10% CTR and 20c average payout, OR
- 25 visitors, 20% CTR and 20c average payout, OR
- 20 visitors, 10% CTR and 50c average payout, OR
- 10 visitors, 20% CTR and 50c average payout, OR
- 5 visitors, 20% CTR and $1 average payout.
Let's assume you choose a goal somewhere around the middle, say aiming for 50 visitors per page and want 274 pages earning $1 a day.
You'd need 274 x 50 = 13,700 page views.. Does that sound too tough?
If so, you'd better look for more profitable keywords and ways to improve your click-through rates.
Let's assume you choose a goal somewhere around the middle, say aiming for 50 visitors per page and want 274 pages earning $1 a day.
You'd then need 274 x 50 = 13,700 page views a day.
Now, if you choose more profitable keywords and make $1 on average per page from, say, 10 visitors... ie., 274 x 10 = 2740 page views a day.
It might look easier to achieve. If your average visitor sees 3 pages, you now need 913 unique visitors a day.
Is that too tough to achieve in your niche? If so, create two sites, each attracting half that number, 456 unique visitors, a day.
Can't achieve those click through rates and payouts?
Then you'll either need more pages on your websites on more niche sites. I have seen click through rates varying between $0.05 and $300, so it obviously pays to do some research on popular keywords.
Also keep in mind that some topics attract much higher payouts per click than others.
For example, if your site is about topics such as debt consolidation or web hosting you'll earn much more per click than if it's about free things. On the other hand, if you concentrate only on top-paying keywords, you'll face an awful lot of tough competition. What you want are keywords that are high in demand and low in supply.
While it could contribute a nice little chunk to your income each month, don't won't follow the lead of those whose sites earn only through Google Adsense.
Mainly because there are times when their Adsense accounts are shut down by Google and they're left scrambling to replace lost income. So only use Google Adsense to supplement your affiliate marketing income and not replace it. Basically, it comes down to value.
Value for you, and value for your visitors.
This happens mainly because if you knowingly, or for testing purposes or even accidentally keep clicking on your own site's Google Adsense links once or twice, Google responds in a different fashion. Because, there are high chances that Google would a clamp on your Adsense account.
So, personally, I feel it doesn't make sense to build an entire site around financial products so as to make a few bucks on Google Adsense clicks, when you can earn up to $40 for a completed credit card application?
So, use Google Adsense to supplement your affiliate income and not replace it.
Basically, it comes down to value. Value for you, and value for your visitors. It's important that visitors find information of value to them on your sites, and you can do that by offering balanced product reviews and articles on the related topic.
If after reading your content, they're not interested in the product or service offerings, then perhaps they'll see an Adsense ad that captures their interest. So placing Google Adsense on your site is a strategy that will put money in your pockets even if your visitors don't buy.
However, in the same way you need to be smart about choosing lucrative affiliate programs, you also want to do your homework when monetizing topics with Adsense.
For example, one of the under represented niche topics with huge markets as a winner is 'snakes'.
Although it's hard to believe, the term 'snakes' had 152,857 searches at Overture in January, and that's a pretty sizeable interest in 'snakes'.
Now it's impossible to fathom who could be interested in such a market?
Kids looking for snake pictures for a school project?
People wanting to buy snakes or someone who wants to visit Snake River?
What are you going to sell? Snakes? The game, 'Snake'?
A $10 book on which you make a 15% commission?
A $60 poster from allposters.com on which you earn a 30% commission seemed to be the best bet, but how many people want to pay $60 for snake posters?
Now, that's not enough interest or commission potential to build a site around 'snakes'.
So, how about incorporating Adsense to boost potential profitability?
Well, search Google for 'snakes' and see what comes up in the Google AdWords column?
ZILCH! NADA!
If you want to monetize with Google Adsense, you have to pick topics whose AdWords advertisers spend mega-bucks per click. How do you figure out what those topics are?
Easy!
If you haven't already done so, open up a Google AdWords account and create a new campaign. Add a list of keywords (one niche topic at a time), then click on 'estimate traffic'. The resulting page will show you the average cost per click for each keyword. Make note of the most expensive words in that list and optimize your pages for those phrases, and that's how you'll really profit with Google Adsense
Yes there is money to be made with Google Adsense and top paying keywords can make you more but don't get ripped off by paying too much for some "magic list".
You can find the above principle highlighted clearly below
| Keyword | Cost Per Click | Clicks/Day | Cost/Day |
|---|
| insurance | $17.41 | 49,893.5 | $868,645.81 |
| credit | $8.67 | 25,705.0 | $222,862.34 |
| auto insurance | $29.48 | 6,453.0 | $190,234.44 |
| travel | $5.02 | 35,084.5 | $176,124.19 |
| mortgage | $13.03 | 12,172.0 | $158,601.16 |
| loans | $9.38 | 13,966.5 | $131,005.77 |
| home insurance | $18.75 | 6,152.0 | $115,350.00 |
| cars | $3.90 | 26,198.5 | $102,174.15 |
| debt | $9.17 | 11,104.5 | $101,828.26 |
| furniture | $1.76 | 57,463.5 | $101,135.76 |
The above information has been "borrowed" from
XEDANT.COMI strongly suggest you visit them, for a detailed breakdown of this awesome list.
It just goes to prove the fact that, keyword prices result in ZERO profit if there are no clicks?
It's cost/day (keyword price X clicks/day) that makes you rich AND not the keyword price itself.
The amazing thing about the Adsense advertising system is how one simple change in positioning of your ads can have a profound impact upon the earnings you receive from it.
The average CTR by Ad Format, they say is
| Format | CTR |
|---|
| 336 x 280 | 7.46% |
| 300 x 250 | 5.58% |
| 728 x 90 | 3.16% |
| 120 x 240 | 2.99% |
| 160 x 600 | 2.44% |
| 120 x 600 | 1.33% |
| 468 x 60 | 0.53% |
The above table makes some sort of sense, which ad format you should be using for managing Adsense ads...
Now this is not all.. you have to learn to how to position the Ad Blocks properly.. You will also subsequently realize that
- the 468 x 60 format is not as effective as the square box (250 x 250)
- the ads should be inside the page rather than in the upper part
- the colors of the ads should be similar to the colors of the website
- it is profitable to create pages targeting high-paying keywords
- the link ad unit is equally, if not more effective
- it is effective to shift ads constantly to gauge the most profitable sequence
- a google search box also should be added (although not a must)
- ore information regarding positioning can be found at the below link
http://www.problogger.net/archives/2005/03/02/positioning-your-adsense-ads/
You can also visit the AdSense Help Center for more Optimization Tips.. their link is given below..
https://www.google.com/support/adsense/bin/static.py?page=tips.html
Now I know of geeks, who have included a small program in their page, which makes the Adsense ads, constantly switch positions in line with entry and re-entry of the same IP address and other factors.. Don’t ask me how they do it, but logically it shouldn’t be too difficult, I guess a class or css file should be able to do it.
More info on this is available at below link;
http://www.johntp.com/2006/06/29/adsense-ad-positioning/
Now for some of the don’ts with Adsense ads
http://www.johntp.com/2006/06/21/sexy-adsense-ads/
A special thanks to Rosie Gardner and Allan Gardyne for their valuable contributions and advise.
All said and done, placing Adsense pay per click adverts is a practical approach to make money using Google Adsense.
