One of the downsides to internet information is that there’s so much of it, and a lot of it is conflicting…
Who are you to believe when some people say;
Google’s ripping you off, Adsense isn’t worth it, Google’s constantly changing the rules, it’s better to use AdBrite etc… ?
The best thing for ANYONE to do when faced with half-truths or conflicting information is to consult with multiple experts on a certain topic.
It’s important to note that “there’s more than one way to skin a cat” as they say, so the best thing to do is see what the common denominators are…
I’m lucky enough to know people who are quietly making 4-5 figure monthly incomes with Adsense and each of them do things differently, but there are some principles they have all abided by.
- Some put up small 5-10 page sites focusing on a few high-paying keywords
- Others build monster sites with a lot of content focusing on high-search volume keywords…
- Another one does a combination of both…
Even when analyzing these truly successful people there’s still some conflicts because they each are successful in their own way, but they ARE successful, and that’s the whole point.
Here are the common denonimators exhibited by these experts…
1- Unique Content only - no dupes, no EZineArticles re-posted, not even any spun content articles from Unique Article Wizard plugin. (I have had minimal success with an Adsense site 100% populated with UAW articles…)
Also, it’s widely reported that 250-word articles are the bare minimum for content pieces, but these 3 experts are posting no less than 300-word articles to their sites. Sometimes they’ll even get 500-word or 750-word articles written for them.
2- Don’t put Adsense on these sites right away. Let these sites get ranked, add unique content periodically, make sure previous articles are indexed before posting new articles.
Once these pure content sites are getting new posts or pages indexed quickly via frequent spidering, the next step is to ascertain the rankings and traffic numbers.
If rankings are good and traffic is coming in steadily, then there’s enough traffic coming in to start testing Adsense on the sites.
3- Testing ad placements and colors. They all tested their site design with various themes. It doesn’t seem to make a difference if they sites are WordPress blogs or HTML sites, and it doesn’t seem to matter if these are static sites or site with new content being added frequently, either.
Part of the reason why Adsense isn’t put on the sites right away is to build up the “trust” with the search engines and to build up enough incoming unique visitors to the site to test Adsense colors and placements accurately.
4- MORE, about site design…
Adsense sites are built with one goal in mind; to get visitors to click on the ads displayed…therefore the site design is instrumental in achieving this desired action.
There’s no distracting banners for affiliate products on their sites, and no link leakage that sends visitors elsewhere… A site designed with Adsens ein mind has to be built differently than other types of sites…and that even includes the way the content is written…
5- How to write content for Adsense sites…
The content has to read like any of the boring articles you might read in article directories that only give you a “taste” of what you really want to know and/or read about.
An effective article submitted to an article directory will act more like a teaser and produce high CTRs (click thru rates).
Since article directories are content sites, your Adsense sites should emulate this type of business model and focus more on the content than anything else.
If your content is TOO good, then you’ve done a good job by FULLY informing your visitors, but therein lies the “danger” of over-fulfilling the visitors’ needs (for information) and could result in low CTRs….
For example, if you wrote an article on your site about mortgage calculators, you’d be better off writing about how best to use one than actually providing the calculator to use, otherwise, there’s nowhere else to go, and nothing else for the site visitor to do once you’ve fulfilled their needs…
Remember what your goal is here with your Adsense sites (to get clicks) and keep that goal in mind as you post content and design your sites…
NEXT UP – Simple ways to easily get decent CTRs for Adsense sites
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Daniel McGonagle
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Dan,
Thanks for the ideas on using Adsense. I am a newbie internet marketer having been at this about two months pretty much full time. All of your advice is consistent with information I have seen from a couple of other people in the biz who also seem to be pretty straight forward. I have seen some success in being on page one of Google for some of the keywords with reasonable search volume without monetizing. My approach has been one of balancing between search volume and competition. Based on results so far I have a reasonable idea of the right mix to end up on page one of Google for a key word with reasonable search volume, including long tail keywords.
Let’s say my keyword plus long tail keywords total search volume = 5,000 exact searches a month. So now I am trying to figure out if the $$$ are going to be worth the time it takes or $$$ outsourced.
So at 5,000 searches a month , and in the number 1 position, I should get 2,100 of those searches using the rule of thumb 42% for the #1 spot. And let’s also say I am getting $1.00 per click through. At a 1% CTR that means I make $21 a month. That’s ok, worth my time and effort. But let’s say I drop down to the number 3 spot, where a lot of people would be happy be. Now my rule of thumb says I get 8.5% of the traffic or 425 searches and at a 1% CTR I make $4.25 – now I’m having second thoughts. If my CTR gets up to 5%, I’m happy again, over $20 per month.
So my question/comment is does Adsense make sense, or are my “goals too high.” Can I really expect to consistently be ranked #1 for keyword combinations with a total search volume of 5,000? Can I really expect a CTR of 5%? Just thinking out loud.
@Mike,
Adsense CTRs can range from 2% to 30-40%.
It’s been my experience some made for Adsense themes are really bad for SEO for some reason, so I’m moving into using good SEO themes and just adding in Adsense via plugins.
I also have an Adsense theme I outsourced tha tis a combination of those 2 things, just waiting on my programmer to finish things up.
Also, you can’t rely on the high paying Adsense words,either since what you get paid fo rclicks is affected by smart pricing and the ads get rotated, and you also need to do some coding changes to make sure you display ads that only target certain kws.
But like all things, traffic solves everything, massive content addition seems to be what works best here, or massive domains purchasing and mini site creations