Yesterday it was revealed that AdSense were making the clickable portions of their Ad Units Smaller. Today we’re seeing these changes rolling out on different publishers sites. It seems that this means different things for different ad unit sizes. For example 468×60 and 234×60 ad units still seem clickable on the text of ads – perhaps because they don’t have a URL on these ads. All other ad units that I’ve seen just have the title and URL clickable.
So my question to you is – have you noticed any decreases in CTR yet?
We probably won’t see the full impact of the changes in today’s earning results as they’ve been rolling out during the day – but my own CTR is lower today than any other day for this month. Having said this – I’ve had lower days (2 were lower in October) – so I won’t really know what impact it’s had for a few days as things do tend to rise and fall.
How about you – is your CTR up or down today?
Way down. 0.04 to 0.00. Sigh.
I have actually had more clicks than ever. But that is only because I just started promoting the website. Will be interesting to hear how it has affected people…
Darren,
Mine is down to the point where the ads really aren’t worth the space they are taking up on the site. Google continue to do this kind of thing. Very one sided business. CTR is down and EPM is the same.
I am pretty bored with Adsense now.
RT
It was down earlier in the day but now it seems I’m kind of “catching up” if all stays like that I think I will be at my average today.
My CTR is down but my earnings per click is up a tad. I am not sure if this is Google playing with the percentage they payout or what. Advertisers haven’t adjusted their rates yet as I believe they will with better quality clicks.
Averaging across all my sites, my CTR appears to be up about 50% compared to the rest of the week – which I find a little odd to say the least!
CTRs are definitely going to get a objectionable dip!.BUt that’s not due to the new rules put up by Google.There’s something else….
By redefining ‘a click’,Google are actually trying to get rid of accidental clicks.Now they pay publishers if their click is genuine(reader intentionally clicks an ad).Since herre we only lose accidental clicks,CTR doesn’t get affected much!.
But other side of online advertsing is that people know what are ads and what they do!.They doesn’t want others to earn money for their click.They may give away a click or two as a pay for extra-ordinary content.SO,a click is getting very hard day by day.
SO would you still believe that CTR would increase some day……?
My clicks are down for sure. I have noticed that my impressions are down too though. I am not sure this has to do with the ads as much as it does with my slowing traffic. I am starting to get frustrated with it. I want it to be on the up and up and I am not sure how to really get my name out there. I am trying to make a good site with good content, but sometimes I feel like people don’t like it because not too many people visit it. Anyway, way off topic. The CTR has seemed down, but the amount of clicks I get anyways may not be enough to really determine whether it is significant.
My CTR has crashed, from 3-4% (+/- 1%) to 0.20% – clicks in the mid 20’s to just 1. $2-3 per day average down to seven cents.
I haven’t had numbers this bad since I started my site three months ago, and if this continues, it won’t even be covering the extremely cheap hosting costs – that says a lot.
my CTR is actually a bit higher than average… maybe the changes haven’t rolled-out to this end of the world yet..
Everything is up for me today.
It looks like mine is down from 22% (over the last month) to 11% today.
I have not seen the change yet on any of my sites/blogs. What I mean by that is the ads are still area clickable. Will this change happen automatically?
Were is the easy money I ask you? Were?! Hahaha
Both of mine seemed to be up… but I don’t know how long that will last! I hope it does, this is a good thing for me!
I’m surprise that people answer that fast I mean wait at least 1 pr 2 months to see the whole picture .. give adsense a chance nobody was yelling when the money was in :)
maybe adsense have other plan .. I think google is not stupid most of their income come from advertising …..
Seems like everything is about normal so far today.
Are there any AD alternatives other than Google?
I started the month at over 45% and the last two days have been at 8-10%. At this rate, November will be a ridiculously low month.
Blackysky may have a valid point, but if he is right, it’s going to hurt for the next few months.
Gisele
http://www.mybeautymatch.com
Definitely earnings have gone done. Very disappointing. Earning s dropped from $70-80/day to $35/40 day with my combined sites. I use many different programs from affiliate to other ad networks and I am considering using them exclusively.
My actual percentage is down about 50% but the average per click has doubled, so money has stayed about the same. I guess that is what Google wants, better leads and higher revenues and payouts.
damn, and i had all those accidental clicks.
The CTR and the number of clicks is stable in November, and up compared to October. Google’s changes didn’t seem to have any impact on my stats.
JLF
http://www.42k195.com
Both my CTR and my revenue has increased MANY fold. I haven’t changed anything about my ads, but I did just upgrade my WordPress installation – maybe that impacted something somehow.
I should mention that my traffic has stayed relatively steady.
Eric
Mine has actually stayed the same at about 2-3%, so I’m not complaining, yet. But, it may be too early to tell.
My blog hasn’t seen the change in format at the time of this writing.
I’m going to need to find some other monetization strategies pretty quickly though, since all I use is Google Adsense.
Its hard to find solid ad solutions that appeal to my niche though.
Well, maybe it is a coincidence, but I had a pretty bad “click day”. By the way, my traffic was better than ever today and I was expecting to see good new numbers on my AdSense account… What a deception.!
CTR hasn’t changed for me yet. I could see that the changes were not yet fully implemented on my ads.
My CTR and CPM have both been on a roller coaster ride for two months. Very high one day and abysmally low the next, varying by up to 300% between the high and low days of the week with no discernible pattern (i.e. weekday/weekend, posting/no posting etc.). So, the fact that my CTR was higher today than yesterday doesn’t necessarily mean much.
Slightly off topic, I will say that returning Adsense to a page I tested YPN ads on after the great Page Rank dustup made more money in a day than YPN made on the same page in a couple of weeks.
not seen any change yet, but then the CTR is as low as before
No significant change here.
Blackysky is making sense. C’mon, you people don’t jump to conclusion so fast. Give it a bit more time and see how it goes.
It’s obviously way to easy to jump to conclusions after barely a day, but I have noticed increase in my CTR and earnings, yay!
no changes here either.
[quote]Averaging across all my sites, my CTR appears to be up about 50% compared to the rest of the week – which I find a little odd to say the least![/quote]
Could it be that those of you who have blogging-related sites are seeing a rise in CTR, as your ad-savvy visitors test out the new ads?!
It kind of figures that Google would do something like this right at the time I’m evaluating Pubmatic :-)
This makes it very hard to know what the heck is going on. Monday I had a good day, 30% over expected. Tuesday was average, as was Wednesday, though maybe a little lower than usual.
So was Monday due to Pubmatic and Tuesday and Wed should have been high but were pulled down by this Google change? Who knows.
I just ride the waves.. whatever happens, happens.
Its now highly targeted, no CTR will obviously changed who’s site ads are not highly targeted.
This makes it very hard to know what the heck is going on. Monday I had a good day, 30% over expected. Tuesday was average, as was Wednesday, though maybe a little lower than usual.
The changes are not active on all my sites and not all my adsense blocks, so far I’ve noticed no change at all!
My CTR seems to have trebled. I’m not complaining!
My CTR has dropped for sure. I have had a day here and there that made no sense. I sense that the network is being updated and my stats are not accurate at times. Per click has gone up which has offset some of the lost clicks. I think that we will all need to tweak and figure out what works.
I find that my adsense income is so volatile at the best of times, that trying to ascertain whether the changes google are making is having any impact after just one day is impossible.
I guess when you are a small fish in a big pond, the smallest ripples can send your income up or down by a large percentage. When you’re that big fish, those ripples may not even register.
In other words, for those of us not making a fortune, the direction the wind is blowing can affect income, let alone changes to the way ads work. If you are a big earner, it might be much easier to spot variations based on changes google makes to its ads, as you are unaffected by other outside influences to the same extent that smaller publishers are.
Does that make sense?
It would be good to distinct the following:
– Are you doing any campaigns (link or ad etc) that counter / change any possible effects of the adsense changes;
– Are all ad units changed in the new format or just a few.
I wouldn’t jump to any conclusions before at least a few weeks have passed.
No changes yet, but my ads have not changed.
The higher Canadian dollar-lower US dollar *IS* affecting my revenue!
Back in Nov 2001, the exchange rate was 1.40!
Weirdly, I’ve made more money today on Adsense than on any other day in the last year, and that’s before 9am my time! It’s still very small amount of money, so you could write it off as an anomaly, but it caught my attention!
~Angela :-)
No changes here yet.
A small drop in CTR compared with yesterday but overall for this month not much difference, although slightly down on October figures. The GBR Pound being so strong against the USD Dollar doesn’t help either!
I’m seeing a small drop, but not particularly outside the normal range of variation. It will take a bit of time to see if it’s a serious change.
We haven’t seen a big drop today. But Im sure its coming. This is an interesting move. On the one hand I can see their position but then on the other I expect them to pay us more for more pinpoint targeting of the real estate we are now renting out…..Im sure that will happen!
My CTR dropped by about 15% today. No increase in RPC. My lowest earnings all year.
Over the last year I’ve seen a slow but steady decrease in RPC and earnings. Now this hit to CTR. AdSense may be reaching the end of its usefulness.
I guess not all the adsense accounts are rolled out. For my site all the adblocks have changed with new format. I am seeing severe drop in the revenue. I am lossing morethan 50% compare to previous earnings. This is very early to decide. I am sure this will say get out for the small publisher like bloggers and people running tons of ads without good contents.