|
A lot of people think "the more the merrier" when it comes to advertisements on their sites. In their attempt to make money online, they cram their sites with every ad type known to man in the hope that something will appeal to everyone coming to their sites. This often turns out to be a waste of time to the blogger and an irritant, to put it mildly, to the blog readers. Let me explain what I mean.
You have a limited window of opportunity to get your message across to your website viewers and a very limited amount of time to convince them to click on your ads or visit your advertisers. That time is precious. By clouding your blog or site with ads from everywhere, you run the risk of having the user not click on anything because they feel overwhelmed. When you have Adsense ads,Kontera/LinkWorth/Text Link ads, ads from Commission Junction, ads from LinkShare, links to stuff from ClickBank , etc. all on one blog or site, you run the risk of advertising overload. Instead of responding with a click on something, the viewer responds by leaving the site. Monetization is great, however, it has to be done with your target audience in mind AND your ultimate goal in mind.
What do I mean by ultimate goal? After all, the goal is just to make money right? The goal is to make money, however, you must have a path that you are going to take to accomplish that goal and your mix has to make sense for what you are trying to accomplish. After all, if you didn't care how you made money, you could just put up a porn site and not worry about blogging at all! (That was a hint for SOME of you out there :0) )If you are trying to make money with Adsense, you need to make sure that other ads on your site aren't stopping you from accomplishing your goal. Here is an example to consider to further explain what I'm talking about.
Let's say that you have Adsense, Kontera, Commission Junction and some LinkShare ads on your site. Let's say that the Google Ads are in a banner at the top, the Kontera ads are double underlined text from words that were already on your blog, a couple of CJ ads are on the left and in the text of your articles, a couple ofLinkShare ads are on the left and then more Google ads are on the right. Now, with this mix, let's assume that someone comes to your site. They read through an article and they click on your Commission Junction ad and leave your site. They get to the vendor's site and look around and then leave that site too. Now, not only has the person left your site, they clicked on something and you didn't get any benefit from it! If you only had Google ads in your text, the user may have clicked on the ad and left your site, but at least you would have made money off of that click. This is just one example of how too many ads can distract the reader and make less money for you. You can never properly channel the reader into clicking on anything if your ads are all over the place. You have to focus. This doesn't mean that you can't have multiple advertising methods on your blog, it just means that you have to be careful about how you mix them.
When you decide to put ads on your site, you need to do so with a goal and a method to achieve that goal. Too many competing ads is not a good thing. You are likely going to need to do some experimentation to discover the right mix for your site. For instance, on some of my other sites, I use Adsense at the top of the sites and CJ ads in the body of my articles only when I'm promoting a CJ advertiser's product or I place CJ ads on the side of the text. I have tested this mix versus other placements and determined that this is a winning combination for those sites, however, on PureBlogic I just use Adsense. The Adsense placements are at the top of the site, at the top of the main article and at the bottom of the main article area. I could have used other methods, but this site isn't really a vehicle I'm using to make money for myself. It is site that I created with the primary goal of connecting with and helping other people. For the sites that are dedicated to making money, the ad placements and mix of ads are a little different. You have to determine what your goal is.
The bottom line is that you shouldn't have too many ads competing for your visitor's attention. You need to use your advertisements in a manner that attracts the user to click on them and you can't possibly do that when you have a site full of ads. Take a look at your site and really investigate which ads should be placed in the positions you have available. Later this week, we will focus on exact ways to determine the type and placement of your ads based on the type of site you have. For instance, blogs about making money online may not offer you much in the way of Adsense, but may offer you more income if you use another advertising method. We will explore this together this week. Until then, take a look at your ads and make a list of the ads you should change.
Posted By Kila Morton
|
