Posted on Wednesday 2nd of January 2008 at 00:03 in Make Money Online

New Adsense has reduced my CTR down 25%

In mid November it was announced that Google were making a change to Adsense where the whole unit was no longer a clickable region, only the URL and title. This has clearly made an effect on the profitability of the scheme for publishers.

I run Adsense on this site as the primary monetisation method and this change has made an impact on my earnings. The simple rule to Adsense click through rate (CTR) is invasiveness; the more annoying the position of the unit - the more clicks you get. So if you embed units directly into your content not only are they visible to most users who read your website but you've got an increased accidental click ratio too.

Accidental clicks are good?
Absolutely - when you're a publisher. That's why I keep away from Google Content Network when doing PPC. As a publisher I care about how much money the website brings in and to increase that I have to accept that not every user who clicks my adverts will intend to. You have to be a little bit evil to make money on the Internet as a publisher...

New Adsense = less accidental clicks
When Google announced the change it meant that 70-80% of the unit is now not clickable; that's a fair proportion and it's going to reduce your CTR quite dramatically (if it hasn't already). Mine has gone down by 25-35% at a guess which is fair, considering I rely so much on the 250x250 unit that sits embedded into my content.

This was just a short post, while I work on redesigning the site (hush hush) which I hope to get up over the next few days. I'll be rethinking the monetisation of the website too so I'll be documenting that when I get around to it. It's fair to say that Adsense isn't quite cutting it for me anymore. Watch this space.

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