I’m interested to see today that there are a number of threads at Webmaster World’s forums that seem to be reporting poor earnings by Adsense publishers over the past few days. (for example here, here and here).
These sorts of threads appear all year around of course but particularly at this time of the year. In fact I’ve had a number of emails and IM’s from people today expressing concern about their Adsense earnings. Why are they down? I’d say it’s for a number of reason:
1. Summer – Whilst I’m currently shivering down here in Melbourne, the Northern Hemisphere is into Summer which is traditionally a flat patch for many websites. People are traveling and enjoying the great outdoors. Until we work out a way to get them surfing the web more whilst sunbathing, swimming, playing golf etc – many sites will have to put up with a little less traffic. Of course for some sites summer is peak time. I imagine travel sites, sports equipment sites etc would be doing ok.
In addition to lower traffic levels – many believe that advertisers decrease the amount they are willing to pay per click at this time of year as a result of the summer holidays. In fact my traffic levels are not too bad at the moment – fairly stable – it’s mainly a decrease in earnings per click that are bringing my overall earnings down (check out this thread for more summer holiday theories and information).
2. 4th of July – a fairly significant proportion of the web surfing market in North America had a long weekend. This always has an impact.
3. London Bombings – a number of bloggers and websites are reporting decreases in earnings today with lower CTR and traffic in some cases. This is understandable. I suspect web usage would be high at the moment (BBC’s site crashed and many others were very slow last night here) but most people were not searching for the type of information that they are normally looking for. Understandable.
My advice – take a ‘blogging as normal’ type approach. In fact while everyone else is on holidays either join them or work doubly hard on your blog so that you reap the rewards in the months ahead. Oh and remember that the Pre-Christmas rush is less than 6 months away!
“Until we work out a way to get them surfing the web more whilst sunbathing, swimming, playing golf etc – many sites will have to put up with a little less traffic”
Funny you should mention this, Darren. Just a couple of days ago the beautiful state of California, where I am lucky enough to reside, announced plans to offer WiFi in 59 of it’s State Parks… because of the low cost of camping, and the incredible scenery, these are where the vast maority of Californians are vacationing during the summer months. Perhaps that summer slump will be changing in the not so distant future ; )
http://www.computerworld.com/mobiletopics/mobile/wifi/story/0,10801,99123,00.html
If this becomes a trend across our nation, I think I’ll try to be the first person to blog from the edge of the Grand Canyon ; )
I’ve experienced a decrease in earnings per click but, as Darren writes, traffic levels have been fairly stable. My core audience is devoted to the site (I run a mountain bike review blog / site) as this is a good time of year for sneak peeks at new products.
I’m betting the decreased earnings-per-click are because of the fact it’s mid-season in the biking world and many retailers are either down on stock or out of stock entirely… No point in advertising if they can’t fill the orders… It’s something to keep in mind if you’re considering coverage of a seasonal activity…
Keep in mind that seasonal swings flatten out over the long haul. My advice is to not get discouraged and keep business going as usual.
It makes me realize the value of diversifying revenue streams. 100% [or close to] dependence on AdSense is a high risk business model, since any number factors [like the ones you have mentioned] could disturb its revenues. Ideally about 50% would be much more stable in the long run.
For a new blogger such as myself this is good news. After months of working on my website I am just now starting to see traffic and adsense income, so mabey after the summer it will skyrocket! Then maybe I will be able to quit my day job, I can’t wait.
Figures I’d try a change of ad layout right on the first of July. Clickthrough rates with my change are down, and earnings per click seem to be down as well, but traffic levels are about the same. As of a couple of hours ago I’ve put the ad layout back to the way it was previously. We’ll see what happens.
Strangely enough, the past few days have been quite good for the network I run and my other ‘smaller’ blogs. But, my highest ‘trafficked’ site – http://weblogs.about.com/ – is suffering a bit from the summer slumps.
Poor July Adsense Earnings
Problogger Darren noticed from webmasterworld posts that many webmasters and bloggers have experienced some poor earnings on Adsense.
I experienced the same thing across my sites and blogs – The impressions and click rates stay on the same level, bu…
After a day with my layout placed back the way it was, I can tell you my earnings are back up and even higher for the day than last month. I’m getting a MUCH higher CPC and my CTR is back to about normal. Almost made up in one day what I lost in the whole last week.
[…] 0th, 2005 Darren Rowse has written a post explaining why we might be having poor July earnings. In this post he explains how recent events such as […]
My earnings are way up this month. I guess it all kinda balances out. Some months your up, some months your down. No sense complaining about it.
Very interesting blog, i have added it to my fovourites, greetings