Chitika News just posted an e-mail response from Chitika about the rumored Text Ads that look remarkably like Google ads. Turns out it's just a rumor, and a leftover from another product that Chitika offered previously - and says they will no longer support.
Guess we are all just used to hearing rumors about Google and Yahoo that, for the most part, turn out to be true later.
I (Roxanne) will be at Affiliate Summit 2006 as a participant from Sunday thru Tuesday morning - the 8th thru the 10th. Look for me at Joel Comm's sessions or at the Speed Networking Event for sure. I will have a red LED badge with Cashkeywords.com running on it (gaudy I know! but not out of place in Vegas, right?). If you can corner me, I just might tell you a few hints/inside info on what Cash Keywords has in store for 2006. Plus I will be giving out some fun things, too, as I meet people.
Full report when I get back - should be some new things we'll hear about while there, and some AdSense publishers to meet, too.
CashKeywords was invited to participate in a podcast with Greg Niland aka GoodROI from the GoodKarma show on Webmasterradio next Thursday. The podcast is scheduled for 4 pm EST, and the first half hour will cover general keyword topics, and the second half will be about CashKeywords Specifically.
I will be the official spokesperson for CashKeywords as usual, and we will be giving away a report for listeners of that show only. After the Broadcast, I will post the audio link and cover some of the topics we discussed, too.
Thinking about the possibility of disaster or something bad happening to you that you are incapacitated or worse isn't pleasant - ever. But it's something I have seriously considered myself and planned for (I even made a will this year). For the first time ever that I can recall, this topic of what to leave in your place if something should happen to you was addressed on WMW. Called "Hit by a Bus" it's not only an apt title, but a thread that gets you thinking, as well as some handy suggestions.
If you have children, it's easy to consider taking the time to write everything down, and make proper arrangements for your business and websites to continue to bring in some cash. If you don't have kids, maybe you have a girlfriend/boyfriend or siblings that can use some help or parents you want to give to. Don't forget, you may not die or pass away, but what if you get really sick for a period of time, or incapacitated and need assistance to continue your online business? If your business is incorporated, you may already have someone designated as an employee/officer of the corporation that can continue to deposit incoming checks and run the business legally.
The New Year is good time to gather up your AdSense Empire codes and the basic info on hosting, passwords, and even suggesting someone to contact for help, or to sell the site(s) to. Just type up this info as clearly as you can so even an internet novice will know what to do, then store it in a safe, safety deposit box, or other predetermined location. I actually keep a "little black book" to write down info I need for my work. Updating this information once a year is a good idea as things change.
Also consider taking the next step towards estate planning and write a letter to your family (survivors) and let then know how to access your documents and what you want them to do, i.e. "First try to maintain sites with Joe Smith's help. As a last resort, contact XYZ.com or Mr. Abc to sell the websites to."
None of this takes the place of a proper Estate Plan or will, and you should contact an attorney in your area to find out what exactly you need.
New tool hot off the presses from Digital Inspiration (saw it via ChitikaNews who pointed it out to me). We knew someone would figure out how to see ad previews for your URL using the current "Big 3" Publisher Networks (MSN - you better jump in there soon, or buy out Chitika and make their New Year). Just enter the URL of the page you want to preview ads on and you can choose from AdSense Color formats, and then select the link to the ad combo you want.
You have your Preview Tool choice of either an IE compatible download, a FireFox extension or an "all-in-one" online tool Great job!
I tried cashkeywords.com and compared Adsense Yahoo. I got OK matching from Adsense, and poor matching from Yahoo, 1 out of 4 relevant ads and the rest ROS garbage - you know Vonage and Mortgage ads. No Wonder YPN CTR is bad, but the one page I did test, despite a poor CTR still got some clicks well over $1 each and so it did as well as Adsense overall - however, I'm not sure what ads got clicked because what I saw on that test of YPN was junk. nice to be able to compare potential ads for the same exact page.....
Hide your website text content, e-mail address or original articles that you don't want ripped off with HideText. This site has an online tool that allows you to insert text into a field, set the characters, and voila! an image of your text you can now add to your blog or website.
I decided to try it, and here's the result using what I just typed:
You can enter up to 100K characters in one image (arial or verdana font only right now), and download the result and delete the image, or link to the image on their server.
This could really foil all those AdSense hungry content burglars from getting your stuff thru copy and paste. They _could_ steal the image, but most image stealers are too dumb to change the image file name if you had to search it out - and these have weird names unless you change them. If text images aren't your cup of tea, you could always use the excellent copyright cop - CopyScape.
The bonus idea is that Google isn't able to index your site content and slap you with a mistaken dupe content penalty, because some guy stole your content and is now benefitting from your hard work. Not being indexed isn't good for rankings, I know, but a clever person could create a mix of text and images to work around the issue.
For an easy way to compare Adsense vs Yahoo Publisher, try this Google AdSense vs. YPN PPC Compare Chart. Granted, the commentary contains the writer's own assessment and opinions, but I found some of them hilarious for being so forthcoming and downright blunt.
I 've been testing Yahoo a little lately, and it's been good or terrible results. The ad inventory is so limited and I end up with alot of run of site ads. I read somewhere it can take up to _2 weeks_ for Yahoo ads to target properly, but who wants to wait that long? When it was good I had $ clicks - although a lower CTR than Adsense. The CTR could be so much better with better ad matching. I have high hopes for them though, and maybe when they drop the beta, the ad quantity and targeting will improve.
I have been working on increasing my revenues and along with that I have made a concerted effort to increase the number of cheap keywords I target in Adwords. The problem is finding enough of these keywords to increase traffic without going broke (I did say "cheap").
I used the new Google keyword tool, and I regularly use my fellow CK-er, Steve's Adword Accelerator to find cheap Adwords keywords. AA Version 2 is rolling out in the next day or so, and it is better than ever with some unique features good for spying on the competition. I also did some research and looked for some free tools that do things I don't want to spend time doing manually. My working list (straight links):
1. Adword Accelerator - I use it regularly as I said :^) New pricing coming with the new version, but 100% guaranteed, and the new stuff it does you can't find anywhere else.
2. PPC Accelerator - Just bought Darren Yates' program (ironically another "accelerator") and for only $47 it's worth every penny -plus the bonus Ad Injector is handy, too.
3. Adwords Wrapper - Free from Mike's Marketing site's tool - and an old standby for me.
4. Keyword Generator - Free tool that let's you take your favorite keyword group and replace a keyword with a list of synonyms and related keywords.
5. Keyword List Cleaner - Free Tool used to be on Webmasterbrain now called "Keyword Optimizer" on SEOchat - Cleans huge lists of duplicates and then alphabetizes :^)
6. Searchspell Typo - Still the best misspellings (really misspelled as if someone spelled by the way the word sounds - not only typos). FYI, misspellings almost always get more traffic than typos - Ignore the really weird spellings like "onleigne" for "online", etc. Searchspell hasn't been working everytime I use it, but great when it does. I think Joe told me the server has hiccups from time to time.
7. SEOtools Keyword Generator - Generates tons of keywords, including stemming if you want, i.e. rent, rental, renter, renting. Plus you can select the keyword order and matching options.
8. Keyword Generator Based on Zip Code - Type in a "base" keyword - just a keyword to start and a zip code and get new keywords using locations in that zip code.
9. Local Adwords Keyword Generator - 5minutesite has a simple, but easy zip code based keyword list creator - plus a built in "permutator" or tool to mix the keywords into every variation. Love it!
10. Location Keyword Lists - I created lists for the US, UK, and Canada of towns, cities, counties, states and provinces. Just plain jane downloadable text files at TrafficGeni.us, ready for copy and paste! Combine the lists with a good permutator and you have thousands and thousands of new keywords for FREE. It's made a big difference in my Adwords campaigns.
If you want to have a selection of products on your pages, but are using the Chitika code to specify products by keywords, you can rotate the products you offer by the day of the week. Amitpatel_3001 wrote it out on the Chitika tips forums, and it can come in handy. This code can help any changes in your weekly traffic vs. weekend traffic to better target your users according to their focus.
Post this code just before your Chitika code and replace the keywords in it with keywords of your choice. Chitika will now serve ads based on day of the week keywords you've specified
< script language="javascript">
var dow = new Array();
dow['Sunday'] = " 'ipod' , 'dell laptop' , 'powerbook' ";
dow['Monday'] = " 'xbox' , 'playstation' , 'nintendo' ";
dow['Tuesday'] = " 'couch' , 'office furniture'";
dow['Wednesday'] = " 'popcorn maker' , 'blender' , 'toaster'";
dow['Thursday'] = " 'cod liver oil' , 'glucosamine'";
dow['Friday'] = " 'braun shaver' , 'norelco shaver'";
dow['Saturday'] = " 'LCD monitor' , 'hard drive' ";
var now = new Date();
var dayNames = new Array("Sunday","Monday","Tuesday",
"Wednesday","Thursday","Friday","Saturday");
< /script>
Doing my regular morning read of Threadwatch and saw this post on Google Analytics. I am sure that the stats and ability to track both site users and ROI on Adwords campaigns in one place will be very good. In fact, some other recent tools Google released I've already raved about.
But as an AdSense Publisher, I can see where these better stats for Adwords publishers may mean:
1. Many more Adwords Publishers tracking their campaign results and ROI compared to those using conversion tracking in Adwords right now. Google Analytics will be a much better tool. More tracking means more AdSense Ads being scrutinized for ROI.
2. More accurate ROI tracking and reporting (Just an assumption as I haven't seen or tested Google Analytics yet), which means a higher likelihood of smart pricing kicking in on AdSense ad revenues to produce lower $ per click for publishers.
3. If you practice Adwords/Adsense arbitrage you may think twice about implementing Google Analytics because there's a possibility you may be causing lower AdSense Revenues for yourself! If your AdSense Ads don't produce a good enough ROI for your own Adwords Ads, you may be contibuting to less $ per click. I don't have a case study on this, but I have seen myself where I used conversion tracking on my Adwords campaigns and saw that for Adwords ads that have low ROI, my AdSense ads on the same topic had less than stellar returns (granted all the Adwords ads on my AdSense pages are from various advertisers).
Definitely, whether Google Analytics makes a dent in Adsense publisher revenues remain to be seen, but it's worth tracking and testing (and perhaps figuring out a way around the potential problem).
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