My Adsense Earnings Are RIDICULOUS!

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Easy_Money

Wow! I read this last night and just changed some of the adsense units on a blog that I purchased a few days ago. The site gets decent traffic yet earned me only $.47 on one day of the first three days I had it.

I changed only half of the ads to show with a red title and the other half I left alone. I have a block with blue titles next toa block with red titles. My earnings on this blog jumped to $1.72 so far today!

I will let it run over the weekend to see if this seems to stay consistent at all or if this just happens to be a coincidence. I'll report back in a few days.

Thanks for posting. I read this before, but your post happened to be here at the right time.

Great job Easy Money! Do you track the different colored headlines through different channels?

My own data is as follows:
November: .38 per day
December (as of 9th): 1.16 per day

Less than half the site is indexed, and I've done little work on backlinks (other than EA). After working with Adwords for so long, I've got to admit that while Adsense is much less sexy, the near 100% profit margin is really nice... On top of that, it's feels good to create something every day.

Back to writing!

Cheers,

Coz

[richaffiliatesnow]

Hello, I have added google adsense to my website and have not made anything, does that mean that people are not clicking on the ads, I only have a small amount of people going to my website at the moment. How do I test that it is actually working properly? It's has been running for nearly a month now.

What about the adsense for search? Does anybody use this and is it worth it?

thanks
clarissa

[trafficguru]

Stick with it! It takes time. I had similar goals and was disappointed with the $1.00/week I was getting. I am now making around $10/day total with a few sites in my network.

-Adam (AKA "The Traffic Guru")

[multimastery]

I find that the Free Google Adwords keyword tool is good for targeting high paying keywords. There are other good free and paid keyword tools out there that you can use in conjunction with that one to maximize your results and profit even more!

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by richaffiliatesnow

Hello, I have added google adsense to my website and have not made anything, does that mean that people are not clicking on the ads, I only have a small amount of people going to my website at the moment. How do I test that it is actually working properly? It's has been running for nearly a month now.

What about the adsense for search? Does anybody use this and is it worth it?

thanks
clarissa

I guess it depends on your traffic, where the ads are placed, etc. Assuming you get at least ten impressions a day and the ads are at the top where people will see them, you should get at least a few clicks...

I don't use search, just text and image ads.

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by trafficguru

Stick with it! It takes time. I had similar goals and was disappointed with the $1.00/week I was getting. I am now making around $10/day total with a few sites in my network.

-Adam (AKA "The Traffic Guru")

Nicely done... Ten bucks a day sounds pretty good to me, especially since I haven't hit an average of $5/day yet.

Still, to start a website that cost exactly ten dollars a year and is already profiting over $1 day within one month makes pretty good business sense to me.

How many sites do you have?

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by multimastery

I find that the Free Google Adwords keyword tool is good for targeting high paying keywords. There are other good free and paid keyword tools out there that you can use in conjunction with that one to maximize your results and profit even more!

I used this tool for awhile:

Seo Book Keyword Suggestion Tool

which is responsible for very little traffic.

Here was my big mistake: I used a Bum Marketing approach for an adsense business model, where I searched for keywords with less than 5,000 competing sites (in quotes). While EzineArticles may wind up on the first page for some of these, the real money comes from getting cozy with the search engines themselves. Even with a decent click through from my articles, I'm not getting enough visitors.

At this point, I signed up for the free 7 day trial of wordtracker, and immediately found keywords with less than 300 competing websites.

For a brand new site, this is much more manageable...

Currently, about 73 pages are indexed, and all of them have stiff competition (these are the keywords chosen from SEO Tools.

There are roughly 100 pages that aren't indexed, most of which have very little competition (chosen from Wordtracker).

Therefore, I imagine once those pages begin to get indexed, I will see a significant rise in earnings (or so I hope) as the search engines pick them up.

For anyone who is attempting to monetize a site with Adsense, here's the key lessons I've learned from month 1:

1. Commit to a number of articles a week. I must submit at least 25 articles a week, either to my site or article directories. While the real pros laugh at this amount (many writing over ten a day) I'm still working full time for another month before quitting. Then the number will jump to 50 per week.

2. Create original content. I've seen too many people lose their accounts lately to even consider posting anything that isn't mine.

3. Use the paid version of Wordtracker, even if it's only the 7 day free trial. If you want to find low hanging fruit, this is the only tool I've found that will get you there.

4. Ensure they are phrases that pay. When you find keywords with less than 300 competing sites, enter the phrase in google and see how many paid ads there are. I made the mistake of writing info pieces that no one is bidding on.

5. Work your ass off. Treat the site like a business. Put in twenty hours a week writing, and learning about SEO. So many people are infatuated with the "4 Hour Work Week" mentality of making passive income in a matter of days. Guess what? The author of that book worked himself stupid to build up his company before setting it on autopilot, and the title was a direct result of split testing 12 titles to determine which would sell more copies (Tim Ferriss has even gone on record saying he hates the title).

6. Decide if this is the right business for you. If you like to write, and are interested in a topic, this may be way to go. If you don't see yourself writing over 7,000 words a week, try something else.

These are lessons from an adsense newbie. I hope others will post hard hitting points that others can benefit from.

Back to work

[Michelle Green]

What size ad block are you using? 336x280 work best in line with your text wrapped around it. I have also heard that you should be getting at least 10 back links for each page.

[justifyleo]

I am slowly building my adsense dollars too and these tips are all great. I just switched to image.

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Michelle Green

What size ad block are you using? 336x280 work best in line with your text wrapped around it. I have also heard that you should be getting at least 10 back links for each page.

Yep, that's the one I use on all the article pages. It's below the headline and sub head...

[Yogini]

Coz,

This is an interesting thread. I sent you a pm .You said:

"Here was my big mistake: I used a Bum Marketing approach for an adsense business model, where I searched for keywords with less than 5,000 competing sites (in quotes). While EzineArticles may wind up on the first page for some of these, the real money comes from getting cozy with the search engines themselves. Even with a decent click through from my articles, I'm not getting enough visitors.

At this point, I signed up for the free 7 day trial of wordtracker, and immediately found keywords with less than 300 competing websites.

For a brand new site, this is much more manageable...

Currently, about 73 pages are indexed, and all of them have stiff competition (these are the keywords chosen from SEO Tools. "

Are you seeing now more traffic and are the clicks higher than they were with more competition? I have been using that 5k figure myself for 3 blogs and 1 does 1.00 plus a day but the other 2 are doing very little. However, when I made a page that had very low competition, though it was high up in google, the cost per click was very low. I am just wondering about this . Also are you getting more traffic both to your site and from ezinearticles found in google now that you switched to less competition?

Deb

[scene4u]

Originally Posted by PalatnkFactor

Try to use Adsense blocks with the least amount of ads as you know the least amount of ads your site shows, the higher you'll get paid since now you are only showing the highest bidding ads on your website, that should increase click payout.

Simple but brilliant advice. I am going to implement in my own sites because my revenues have been falling recently I do not understand why.

[RBum78]

Are u using corrent ads placement?

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Yogini

Coz,

This is an interesting thread. I sent you a pm .You said:

"Here was my big mistake: I used a Bum Marketing approach for an adsense business model, where I searched for keywords with less than 5,000 competing sites (in quotes). While EzineArticles may wind up on the first page for some of these, the real money comes from getting cozy with the search engines themselves. Even with a decent click through from my articles, I'm not getting enough visitors.

At this point, I signed up for the free 7 day trial of wordtracker, and immediately found keywords with less than 300 competing websites.

For a brand new site, this is much more manageable...

Currently, about 73 pages are indexed, and all of them have stiff competition (these are the keywords chosen from SEO Tools. "

Are you seeing now more traffic and are the clicks higher than they were with more competition? I have been using that 5k figure myself for 3 blogs and 1 does 1.00 plus a day but the other 2 are doing very little. However, when I made a page that had very low competition, though it was high up in google, the cost per click was very low. I am just wondering about this . Also are you getting more traffic both to your site and from ezinearticles found in google now that you switched to less competition?

Deb

I just sent you a PM with my reply...

However, to answer here for everyone:

The first 120 pages I submitted were highly competitive. Most are indexed, and receive little to no traffic from search engines.

The next 75 pages I submitted were not nearly as competitive. Sadly, those pages have not yet been indexed, so I can't compare the two.

My focus in the past two days has been on link building. I have submitted my site to 50 directories, and wrote ten more EZine articles, with two backlinks to two different pages on my site (the less competitive terms).

I really hope that directories pay off! Does anyone here submit to directories as well?

Earnings still hover around a dollar a day...

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by RBum78

Are u using corrent ads placement?

Sorry, I don't understand your question...

[cozandeffect]

Yesterday proved to be an all-time high of $3.73.

A bunch of new pages just got indexed.

Back to work...

[Boonee]

Congrats on your progress. What is your current adsense CTR?

Thanks

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Boonee

Congrats on your progress. What is your current adsense CTR?

Thanks

sorry, that's against google's TOS...

[Boonee]

Oh. I didn't realize that. I have seen so many other people talk about their CTR on this and other forums.
So, I'll ask a different question. How many pages do you have indexed in total now on your site? And, how many articles do you write per day? About how long does it take to write each article?

Thanks again,
Bridget

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Boonee

Oh. I didn't realize that. I have seen so many other people talk about their CTR on this and other forums.
So, I'll ask a different question. How many pages do you have indexed in total now on your site? And, how many articles do you write per day? About how long does it take to write each article?

Thanks again,
Bridget

No worries Bridget...

There are 174 pages in my sitemap. Currently, 130 are now indexed.

I write 5 articles a day (25 per week). Each one takes an average of 30 minutes to research/write.

This week I haven't been writing, choosing instead to focus on backlinks...

[arvin.buising]

How is your website doing so far? Is it making money now?

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by arvin.buising

How is your website doing so far? Is it making money now?

Overall, the earnings are hovering about $1.07 per day (up from .35 per day last month). I'm starting to see my pages in the search engines, but there still pretty deep.

For example, I'm number one for a term in quotes, but without quotes I'm at 126...

Backlinks seem to be the most important thing right now.

A side note: I received three clicks yesterday, but Google deemed them invalid.

That's fine with me... if advertisers aren't getting value from advertising due to invalid clicks, they shouldn't pay.

Back to work...

Coz

[Boonee]

Coz,

How many EzineArticles do you have written in total? And, are you deep linking those articles to the article pages of your site as well as your home page? Any other methods of link building besides articles and directories?

Bridget

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Boonee

Coz,

How many EzineArticles do you have written in total? And, are you deep linking those articles to the article pages of your site as well as your home page? Any other methods of link building besides articles and directories?

Bridget

Hi Bridget,

38 EA articles so far. At first, I would backlink one keyword rich anchor text to a specific article page (deep link) and one link to my homepage.

Lately, in an effort to speed up the indexing of new pages, I add two deep links to two different pages.

So if I write an article about cat food, I'll link it to the pages optimized for "best veggie cat food" and "premium cat food."

So far, submitting to ezinearticles and website directories have been it. I've appealed to several authority sites in the hopes of writing an article for them in exchange for a link, but have not heard back yet.

As time goes by I am amazed at Xfactor's ability to do the following three things:

1) get so many pages indexed so quickly
2) get them to the top of the search results so quickly
3) achieve such high earnings WITHOUT any marketing except articles (initially)

... the guy really is an inspiration!

[Boonee]

Yes, I agree. Xfactor is certainly an inspiration. And, so are you for getting in there and working the program and sharing your progress.

Xfactor's almost immediate and impressive adsense earnings is why I asked about your CTR. It seems his high CTR had much to do with his initial earnings.

Thanks,
Bridget

[Gelo30]

I also have same problem. . . I only got cents for a month and having hard time to get $ 1. I complete the $ 100 in less than 1 year.

[chailak]

I think your content is bringing low CPC ads to your webpage from google . You need to target more profitable keywords .

[abibakar]

I stop expecting too much from Adsense since I get only $10 for about 5 or 7 months, although the traffic of my blogs that I put Adsense within are high enough, this because people know that it's adsense and they do anything not to click the ads, it's better to point to another money stream that certainly would drive us some good money than waiting for some good guy click our ads

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by chailak

I think your content is bringing low CPC ads to your webpage from google . You need to target more profitable keywords .

It's hard to tell. The payments are all over the place (probably due to the variety of topics).

I've tried using Spyfu, but to be honest, it doesn't help me much. Almost every keyword I type in shows no results.

What I do now is type the keyword in google and see how many ads pop up.

Is there anyone here who is having success with Spyfu? I'd love to hear your feedback.

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by abibakar

I stop expecting too much from Adsense since I get only $10 for about 5 or 7 months, although the traffic of my blogs that I put Adsense within are high enough, this because people know that it's adsense and they do anything not to click the ads, it's better to point to another money stream that certainly would drive us some good money than waiting for some good guy click our ads

You may be correct, though I'm already earning $30 per month with this site (admittedly not much, but hey, it's something) with a tragically small amount of traffic. I'm considering sprinkling affiliate links in there, but this is intended to be an adsense based revenue stream.

If anything, this is an education in SEO.

I keep hearing from others about how they get to the top of Google for these huge phrases in a matter of days...

must be nice

I don't have those results, but am going for the long term, stable route.

Best regards,

Coz

By the way, does anyone know of a tool where you type in a keyword, and it shows you what position your website is in? It'd save a bunch of time!

[cozandeffect]

A quick update:

This past week earnings have risen to $1.96 per day, with a record high of $5.58!

I also received an approval to write a 3000 word article for a high authority site, which offered to pay me, or feature a prominent link to my site. Naturally, I chose the latter, as an improvement on ALL my pages in the SERP's would be worth far more than what they could pay...

I really hope this acts as proof that Adsense does work, provided you work for it.

Back to work,

Coz

[mergemedia]

Here's a recent screenshot showing my adsense revenues from November. 15k.

[Mari_Quint]

This thread certainly helps in my issues with adsense. I've been trying to place ads in different positions to see which one works best.

[Yogini]

Coz,

That's great that the daily revenue is up. Are you seeing more revenue from the more competitive pages now? You had written you thought it was a mistake to have so many pages that weren't very low hanging fruit. I am wondering if you now are getting traffic to them and if the adsense clicks are higher there than on the lower fruit pages?

Debbie

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by mergemedia

Here's a recent screenshot showing my adsense revenues from November. 15k.

Wow, GREAT job on your business! How many sites do you have to earn that?

Further proof that this is a viable business model.

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Yogini

Coz,

That's great that the daily revenue is up. Are you seeing more revenue from the more competitive pages now? You had written you thought it was a mistake to have so many pages that weren't very low hanging fruit. I am wondering if you now are getting traffic to them and if the adsense clicks are higher there than on the lower fruit pages?

Debbie

Hi Debbie,

The additional earnings are a result of the lower hanging fruit getting noticed in the search engines. The more competitive keywords are still not receiving any traffic.

To a lesser extent, several more articles just got published, and the ctr has risen a bit as well.

However, the low hanging fruit is making the difference right now.

It will interesting to see what effect the link from the authority site will have on my positions in google.

By the way, I just incorporated analytics with adsense, and couldn't be happier. Now I can see traffic, impressions, earnings, ctr, and eCPM for each and every page. An invaluable (and free) tool!

[Yogini]

Hi Coz,

That is really great news. Do you put the main keyword in the articles or on page so your clicks are higher ? I know some low hanging fruit have very little costs at adwords so they can't pay out too much with adsense. So somehow the higher paying ads have to get on the pages to make better money.

Debbie

[Boonee]

Nice progress Coz!
How do you go about finding your high authority sites?
Can you give a sample of what you say when you approach them to write an article?

Thanks,
Bridget

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Yogini

Hi Coz,

That is really great news. Do you put the main keyword in the articles or on page so your clicks are higher ? I know some low hanging fruit have very little costs at adwords so they can't pay out too much with adsense. So somehow the higher paying ads have to get on the pages to make better money.

Debbie

Hi Debbie,

Generally, the low hanging fruit is three to five words long, and contain the higher paying keyword within. I try to sprinkle variations (including synonyms) throughout the article, and only use the keyword as the title, sub head, intro and conclusion (sometimes even less).

It seems to work: when I search for terms in quotes I'm usually at the top.

This is how I determined that more backlinks were needed. Obviously, on-page optimization was spot on...

I'm very happy with earnings per click. Definitely no "WTF!" moments.

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Boonee

Nice progress Coz!
How do you go about finding your high authority sites?
Can you give a sample of what you say when you approach them to write an article?

Thanks,
Bridget

Hi Bridget,

Thanks for the support. As for high authority sites, I've done the following:

1) search through their site to see if they accept articles
2) visit their "links" page and check out those sites as well

Most that are interested in articles have an online submission form. I read a few of their existing articles and their guidelines, and just go for it.

I'm almost done with this article, which will be added to a PR 7 site. The article itself will probably be on a PR 3 page, and I'm not sure how this affects search engine results.

However, EzineArticles is a PR 6, and the articles are on a PR 0, so I'm beginning to think high authority sites are well worth the trouble.

Only time will tell.

Back to work,

Coz

[Yogini]

Coz,

I appreciate your replies and one more follow up: You said:

Generally, the low hanging fruit is three to five words long, and contain the higher paying keyword within. I try to sprinkle variations (including synonyms) throughout the article, and only use the keyword as the title, sub head, intro and conclusion (sometimes even less).

For the meta tags for the page do you use the phrase too or are you using the higher paying short phrases (ie the title tag and description tag). I just got a site up to 2.00 a day too after about 6 weeks but see some of the new phrases I want to use that are longtail only have 1-3 ads in google so I am thinking that I need to also optimize page at same time for the shorter phrases.

Debbie

[Evita]

Originally Posted by cozandeffect

By the way, does anyone know of a tool where you type in a keyword, and it shows you what position your website is in? It'd save a bunch of time!

Check this place:
Search Engine Placement Check - Marketleap Search Engine Verification Tool
Or this one: (This appears to be working only for older sites, but you can see all the kw's your competitor is ranking for...
SeoDigger.com

If you are already making an average of $1 per day with such a new site, you will no doubt do very well. Once you are ranking in Yahoo, MSN and some of the smaller engines your traffic will increase, and once your site is a bit more mature, your rankings will get better and better...

Provided you are doing some back linking...

You are so on the right track

People keep talking about clicks that pay well, but really, it is the combination of how much can you get per click, and how much traffic can you generate. Sometimes the lesser keywords are much easier to drive traffic to...

At the end of the day it is how much money did you make...

Evita

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Yogini

Coz,

I appreciate your replies and one more follow up: You said:

Generally, the low hanging fruit is three to five words long, and contain the higher paying keyword within. I try to sprinkle variations (including synonyms) throughout the article, and only use the keyword as the title, sub head, intro and conclusion (sometimes even less).

For the meta tags for the page do you use the phrase too or are you using the higher paying short phrases (ie the title tag and description tag). I just got a site up to 2.00 a day too after about 6 weeks but see some of the new phrases I want to use that are longtail only have 1-3 ads in google so I am thinking that I need to also optimize page at same time for the shorter phrases.

Debbie

Seems like we got on the boat at the same time.

I just use the keyword in the meta tag. I'm not really sure if it matters.

[Steve Crooks]

There could be a number of factors here, but first of, if you are only getting a trickle of visitors to your site then it is difficult to see how well your adsense is performing.

1. Where have you got your adsense blocks on your site?
2. What niche are you targetting?
3. How good is your on and off site SEO?
4. How competitive are your target keywords in the search engines?
5. Is your content good?

Originally Posted by richaffiliatesnow

Hello, I have added google adsense to my website and have not made anything, does that mean that people are not clicking on the ads, I only have a small amount of people going to my website at the moment. How do I test that it is actually working properly? It's has been running for nearly a month now.

What about the adsense for search? Does anybody use this and is it worth it?

thanks
clarissa

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Evita

People keep talking about clicks that pay well, but really, it is the combination of how much can you get per click, and how much traffic can you generate. Sometimes the lesser keywords are much easier to drive traffic to...

At the end of the day it is how much money did you make...

Evita

I agree. Provided you create quality content, sometimes just getting new visitors to your site will improve your earnings.

And it is all about the money...

Thanks for the tool. You just made my life a lot easier!

Best regards,

Coz

[Yogini]

Hi Coz,

When you said:

Generally, the low hanging fruit is three to five words long, and contain the higher paying keyword within. I try to sprinkle variations (including synonyms) throughout the article, and only use the keyword as the title, sub head, intro and conclusion (sometimes even less).

Do you mean you'll say write on debt consolidation in brattelboro vermont
but hope to get the advertisers for debt consolidation? I have some long tail phrase pages that don't seem to get many advertisers on them despite the root phrase being there.

Yeah, I started a site around same time as you I think and it's doing 2.00 a day but 2 others are around .40 a day.

Debbie

[skinnye]

This thread is really helpful, but I have a few questions. Does changing your ad color to something that stands out make a big difference over time or just short term?
I'm a relative newb at this, so what is backclicking?
Also are free hosting sites such as blogspot good to start out with or using your own domain the best way to go, I have plenty of extra webspace leftover from my forum but am new to web design as well so I'm a little hesitent to start building new sites.

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by Yogini

Hi Coz,

When you said:

Generally, the low hanging fruit is three to five words long, and contain the higher paying keyword within. I try to sprinkle variations (including synonyms) throughout the article, and only use the keyword as the title, sub head, intro and conclusion (sometimes even less).

Do you mean you'll say write on debt consolidation in brattelboro vermont
but hope to get the advertisers for debt consolidation? I have some long tail phrase pages that don't seem to get many advertisers on them despite the root phrase being there.

Yeah, I started a site around same time as you I think and it's doing 2.00 a day but 2 others are around .40 a day.

Debbie

I figure that advertisers for debt consolidation would still appear on my site. Even if they bid on "debt consolidation" in quotes, my page is optimized for it.

When I research a keyword, I'll often search for it in quotes (to confirm competition) and notice how many advertisers there are. Then, I'll search for the phrase without quotes, and note the change of advertisers. This lets me know if people are bidding on at least part of my phrase, which helps.

However, when it takes 20-30 to write an article, I generally just write the damn thing anyway and forget about it!

[cozandeffect]

Originally Posted by skinnye

This thread is really helpful, but I have a few questions. Does changing your ad color to something that stands out make a big difference over time or just short term?
I'm a relative newb at this, so what is backclicking?
Also are free hosting sites such as blogspot good to start out with or using your own domain the best way to go, I have plenty of extra webspace leftover from my forum but am new to web design as well so I'm a little hesitent to start building new sites.

Please keep in mind this is just my opinion and others may have different advice:

As for ad color, it depends. Some sites get me to click on the ad because it blends so well. I get people to click on my ads because they contrast... the only way to know for certain is to set up different channels and test the outcome.

Back clicking is when a user clicks on an Adsense ad, then returns to your site and clicks another adsense ad. Google seems to be fine with this, as it makes sense: why type in a URL when you can just click the link? Of course, if people are back clicking dozens of times on the same ads, they'll probably be deemed invalid and you won't get paid.

I'm all for owning the domain, even if it costs ten bucks (plus cheap hosting). Any website following this business model is for the long term, and I want to own it outright.

I don't know anything about web design, but recently married a web designer, which helps! Having said that, nvu.com is a free web authoring tool, or you could try using XSitePro, which a lot technophobes seem to use. Your call.

Hope this helps.

Back to work,

Coz

[mongo22]

Hi guys, just joined the site. Love the information you are providing. Good conversation. My blog is 4 months old, but I average about 1000 views a day. It hasn't translated to much profit. I make about $1 or less a day and was thinking about dumping Adsense after I get my first $100 check. I'm up to about $94. I changed the location of my ads & from what I'm reading, I probably need to work on my keywords.

Thanks for all the information. I'm hoping I can use it to better monetize my site. My primary goal is usability & as little user irritation as possible, but also would love to make a few more bucks along the way.