Oct 09 2008
A Couple of New Maybe Obvious Tips
I had lunch a while ago with a net buddy who was picking my brain about the whole making money online deal. I can spout on for hours on this topic (and I did) and I made a couple points that I thought were sort of obvious but took the guy by surprise a bit. So I figured I’d keep the tips ball rolling and share a couple other little things that you might not have considered before.
Google Adsense Placement
As I wander around the web I always come across Google Adsense blocks crammed right at the top of a webpage and I’ll never understand it. Most of the time they’re barely blended but even if they are, I still don’t see why this placement would result in a click. I’m always spouting on about how traffic arriving through Google searches is more likely to click on Adsense. So if a visitor arrives from Google, you have to assume that they’re searching for some sort of information.
If they’ve found your site compelling enough to click on the link in Google, why would they click away from your site at the top of the page on the Adsense ad before reading the information you have on offer? I wouldn’t. I’d read the information on the site to see if I could find what I was looking for and then, if I was going to click away from the site, I’d probably do it at the end of the article rather than scroll back up to the top.
So while I’ll put Adsense above the fold in many cases, I’ll never cram it way up at the top and I always try to put an ad at the end of the article to make clicking on for more information easy for the reader and good for my monthly Adsense income. It’s just a hunch of course but I have pretty good Adsense click through rates without having ever stuck Adsense blocks at the top of my pages.
Outbound Links
I want people to like my sites and and enjoy what they’re reading and all that, but I also want them to leave at some point. But when they do leave, I want them to leave either through an Adsense link or a link to an affiliate program. I don’t want to be sticking up all sorts of other means of escape for them that don’t have the potential to make me money. So, as much as adding links to Wikipedia and other sites with more information may benefit your reader, it won’t really do much for your efforts to make money so I’d suggest leaving them out.
Plus, adding loads of outbound links will ooze link juice, possibly lowering your site’s PR in the process. My Working Holiday Insurance site had a PR of 5 as of a couple of months ago. I had no idea how I pulled this off and then I remembered that I made it my goal to have zero outbound links that weren’t either Adsense or affiliate links. I started selling links to capitalise on the PR5 and my PR has dropped like a stone. I’m going to try the zero outbound links thing again with some new sites of mine and will keep you posted on the results.
Just another couple of probably lame, really obvious tips to add to the collection. Next time I post I’ll probably be doing it from my parent’s kitchen having eaten a home cooked Thanksgiving turkey dinner. Can’t wait!
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I've been travelling since January 2008 living off earnings from the web. Follow me as I bum around Asia and beyond, getting up to mischief and working online as I go. 
I agree with Google Adsense placement, it would make sense to have some “money making” possibilities there. I might change that on my websites… I currently only focus on redirecting to more articles.
Concerning the outbound links, I think for a blog it’s a question of balancing between affiliate links but also normal linking : yes we want to be rewarded but it’s nice also to get trackbacks (when you link to some other blogs, it leaves on these blog a comment with a link to your post) for traffic. With no traffic, no money…
Oops! Blogs not included. But I’ve never thought of blogs as a moneymaker really. I don’t use them to make money so I kind of forget that other people do. So ya… if you’re a blogger then outbound links are good for creating a network and all that good stuff. Although if you want to make money from your blog I wouldn’t go too nuts with the outbounds.
I think there are two schools of thought here on whether the outbound links will eventually dilute your PR. Speaking from my own personal experience, the opposite is true for me as I see an increase in PR from my inner pages where I did lots of linking out to other blogs. Therefore, I’m more partial towards linking out to other bloggers.
Yan
“So, as much as adding links to Wikipedia and other sites with more information may benefit your reader, it won’t really do much for your efforts to make money so I’d suggest leaving them out.”
Perhaps put the authority links (like wiki) at top, where people scanning for quality websites will see them quickly, but sales links at the bottom, the next logical step for the surfer to click on adwords or affiliate link, you having had the chance in text above to presell something to them?
yes, they were really good tips! I enjoyed the conversation.
[…] My goal is to keep building on my earnings, and I’m hoping to top Adsense out at $400 a month. Whether this will be feasible or not is anyone’s guess, but I’m making strides to get there. I’ve been working to build new niche sites at a quicker pace, and I’m working on fleshing out content to target more lucrative keywords. If you’re interested, there’s some great Adsense placement tips over at Nerdy Nomad. […]
Have you tried Crazy Egg? It’s a neat tool that lets you see graphically where people click on your pages. I use the free version a lot when tinkering with ad placement and love it.