4 ms·

"If Mahalo’s traffic was utter crap, it would be dropped." That's not even close to true. If it were, there would be no AdSense for parked pages program. Their

"If Mahalo’s traffic was utter crap, it would be dropped." That's not even close to true. If it were, there would be no AdSense for parked pages program. Their eye is still very much on their own bottom line, not the advertisers.

hernan7 17y ago
There's also the possibility that aggregator sites are actually useful for some portion of the Internet users (read: the "facebook login" set) and the advertisers that cater to them. Too bad "we" have to share Google with "them".
- wmeredith 17y ago
  Not to be too cynical, but after several years in web marketing I've found that in this case "we" definitely do not outnumber "them." Not by any stretch of the imagination.
  - hernan7 17y ago
    That goes without saying.
aaronwall 17y ago
Here is a link about how search monetizes when compared to content sites (~ 30 to 1!) http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007053 http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007053 As an extension of that, sites which get most of their traffic from search often have the highest ad CPM values because the ad targeting is so relevant on the AdSense ads. And this is true even moreso now that Google is also using the referrer for ad targeting http://adsense.blogspot.com/2010/02/better-contextual-matching.html http://adsense.blogspot.com/2010/02/better-contextual-matchi... Scraper sites do quite well on the ad revenues front because most of the traffic is search driven, and because the content ends up so bad that the ads look all the more appealing.
aresant 17y ago
"Their eye is still very much on their own bottom line, not the advertisers." I know for a fact that Google is balancing advertiser ROI against advertising spend and ensuring that they don't upset the apple cart. However you are absolutely right that Google is maximizing their profit – having the ROI numbers in hand lets them drive down overall sales-from-adsense margins while still keeping the customer. So my original point is that if Mahalo was flat out non-performing crap, it would be tossed. An argument could be made though that they use the Mahalo stuff to grow ad inventory, while balancing out the ROI to their advantage since it likely converts on the lower end of the scale.

hernan7 17y ago

There's also the possibility that aggregator sites are actually useful for some portion of the Internet users (read: the "facebook login" set) and the advertisers that cater to them. Too bad "we" have to share Google with "them".

wmeredith 17y ago
Not to be too cynical, but after several years in web marketing I've found that in this case "we" definitely do not outnumber "them." Not by any stretch of the imagination.
- hernan7 17y ago
  That goes without saying.

aaronwall 17y ago

Here is a link about how search monetizes when compared to content sites (~ 30 to 1!) http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007053 http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007053 As an extension of that, sites which get most of their traffic from search often have the highest ad CPM values because the ad targeting is so relevant on the AdSense ads. And this is true even moreso now that Google is also using the referrer for ad targeting http://adsense.blogspot.com/2010/02/better-contextual-matching.html http://adsense.blogspot.com/2010/02/better-contextual-matchi... Scraper sites do quite well on the ad revenues front because most of the traffic is search driven, and because the content ends up so bad that the ads look all the more appealing.

aresant 17y ago

"Their eye is still very much on their own bottom line, not the advertisers." I know for a fact that Google is balancing advertiser ROI against advertising spend and ensuring that they don't upset the apple cart. However you are absolutely right that Google is maximizing their profit – having the ROI numbers in hand lets them drive down overall sales-from-adsense margins while still keeping the customer. So my original point is that if Mahalo was flat out non-performing crap, it would be tossed. An argument could be made though that they use the Mahalo stuff to grow ad inventory, while balancing out the ROI to their advantage since it likely converts on the lower end of the scale.