Adsense Secrets: Basic AdSense

While AdWords™ is Google™'s program directed to advertisers, AdSense™ addresses to publishers. We participate in both programs and we've already drawn some guidelines on AdWords™. So, here we are, aiming not to build a guide on AdSense™ (as Google™ has already a good one!) but to share from our experience with it and to present it in a simplified, structured, friendly manner.

Thus, to begin at the beginning,

What Is AdSense™?

It is one of the most used revenue sharing programs at the present moment. AdSense™ is part of Google™'s advertising system allowing website owners to earn money easily and rapidly by displaying relevant ads on their websites.

Roughly, AdSense™'s functioning principle is: ads are administered by Google™ and monetize on a pay per click (PPC) basis.

They introduced just recently the cost per thousand impressions (CPM) advertising system (or, should we say re-introduced? thinking that AdWords™ started initially as a pay per view advertising program).

AdSense™'s Pink Side

What made it make sense for many and gain huge popularity was that:

it actuates a win-win situation and it's designed for the lazy: it produces money requiring no effort.
Why a win-win program

The readers see ads that interest them, the publisher gets additional advertising revenue without effort. The only risk involved is generated by the universal, mighty fear of the publisher of being kicked out of the program, which would be not only an unpleasant situation but might trigger a chain of unfortunate events. But the complexity of this topic requires a separate space and is to be found with more details in How to Qualify for Using AdSense™ and How to Deal with CTR Fraud.

Why for the lazy

Website maintenance does not require special attention, other than normal. That is, you just have to insert your AdSense™ code on your pages and it will take care of the ads. This way, you can concentrate on your site's content, not having to deal with lots of affiliate's codes.

the program was a success due to the fact that, when introduced (back in 2003), it came as a fresh advertising method, an alternative for banners, which worked no longer efficently. The ads were less obtrusive and more content relevant.

it allows even “small” publishers monetize their websites if they are high-quality, by promoting content-rich sites.

AdSense™'s Blue Side

Well, so far it's great, you'll say, BUT there has to be something not-so-wonderful about it. And there is! In fact, there are some things:

They do not disclose the exact revenue share of the publisher , neither what influences it. This limits webmasters' control over financial factors.
The program terms do not allow you to share with others information on any site performance statistics. This could be rather frustrating if you wanna know how you're doing compared to other AdSense™ users.
In March they modified their confidentiality policy on payment allowing program users to disclose their earnings.
The stats are incomplete (even with channels). There are still some shortcomings and there is still data missing:
- The stats are not accurate: the update of stats is not constant in frequency and is often not synchronized. Thus you may find at a certain moment no change for a longer period in your stats; or the data on page impressions and those of clicks from different times in the day. Some realtime reporters are:AdSense™ Tracker, AdSense™ Monitor, a realtime earnings reporter —Revenue Checker for Google™ AdSense.
- A detailed report on earnings is not available. Users find it useful to know exactly which sites/pages generate the most clicks and revenue, which ads are clicked on, details on the “winning” ad formats/colors. Webmasters can use channels, but there are still limitations in the amount and details of data. There are helpers permitting to get accurate reports on your earnings.
Sometimes the automatically targeted ads are not best fitted. Though not very important, there are still errors in matching ads to the page's content.