Your experience with Google AdSense?

[hermione]

Hi everyone, I'm just starting a blog and am thinking about getting Google AdSense. I've read the policies, but just wanted to get an idea of your personal experience with and/or opinions of the program.

- Have you had problems with their policies such as being denied payments?

- Have you had problems with them saying your site had "invalid clicks and impressions"? Do they have an IP blocker so that you don't get penalized for excessive impressions or accidental clicks while working on your site?

- Are we allowed to have referrals in our content such as Amazon Associate links for recommending books, movies, etc.?

- Are the earnings significant (I understand if you can't give exact figures) to be worthwhile and not just a few cents a month?

- Do any WordPress users have a recommendation for a particular AdSense plug-in or widget?

I'm totally new at this - only started making up my site last night, so any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

[rstlne]

How much web traffic do you get? I have Adsense but it appears that I only get one click-thru for every one thousand impressions on average so a few cents a month is what I've been earning through Adsense. (Haven't received my first check yet.)

[Jeremy]

I've been using adsense since about 2002 and have never had any issues with denied payments or the like. They have been a fantastic company to deal with in a business sense.

I've never had problems with invalid clicks either, but I also make sure to alert them if I notice suspicious activity. Way back when I first got started I had about a dozen clicks in the span of an hour when I would usually get just 1 or 2 a day, so I emailed them with a heads up that I saw this type of activity. They promptly responded and thanked me for the information.

As far as earnings go, I'd say that it is right up there along with or sometimes my top means of income from my site. There is no way I'd take it off my site.

But if you're just getting started, I'm not even sure I'd bother with adsense. Without search engine traffic to your site, adsense will be almost worthless. It may take six months or more to get your first check from them. It won't hurt you to put it up if you're just starting a site, but don't expect anything for quite a while. I don't use any wordpress plugins (although there are some out there) and I just code the ad units into my template where I need them.

[Xin Lu]

I got my first check after six months. The first month I made just under $2.00. This month has been good since I have been writing for Wise Bread. The earnings are averaging maybe $3 to $4 a day so hopefully I will be able to get a check every month. I have found that a lot of high traffic days (being linked by a big blog/digg) tend to have lower click through rates than just normal days when people come and read my stuff.

[purplefdu]

Most people would tell you Adsense is one of the best profit systems, if you can keep all your clicks and impressions. I make next to nothing because my blog gets next to no traffic, but I'm working on it. If you'd like to read some information about other ad programs, earnings, and experiences I suggest you head over to Digitalpoint's Forums.
http://forums.digitalpoint.com/

[CheapCanuck]

From what I've read Adsense is ultimately the most lucrative, post the code and forget about it, way of advertising on your blog. I only started my blog last week, so not much traffic yet. Still anxiously awaiting my first click. I also diversified a bit, adding a program that pays strictly for visitors to your website, without having the need for them to click anything. Hopefully it will earn me a few bucks while I am waiting for traffic to build.

[hermione]

Thanks, everyone for your responses. It sounds like a good program. Now I just gotta get things rolling with my blog - I've got the template and stuff all set up and just need to start writing.

CheapCanuck: Which program is that that strictly pays for visitors to your site, if you don't mind sharing?

[CheapCanuck]

Hermione - it is called Pay per Play ads. You embed their code in your website and a short 5 second audio ad plays when a visitor comes to your site.

[Megan]

Originally Posted by CheapCanuck

Hermione - it is called Pay per Play ads. You embed their code in your website and a short 5 second audio ad plays when a visitor comes to your site.

*shudders*

CheapCanuck, I know that this might bring in a good amount of revenue, but honestly, I think that auto-playing sound is a pet peeve of a lot of blog readers, and from a personal standpoint, if I visited a blog that had that, it would take some seriously good content to make me ever want to visit again.

[CheapCanuck]

I guess it depends on the ads. Haven't actually heard any of them yet. I figured it would not be as annoying to a reader than a pop-up/pop-under that actually requires action of them. For right now, I think they are in closed beta anyways. If there seems to be an overwhelming sentiment of negativity directed towards them I definitely won't be hosting them on my blog.