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yeah those guys are scum Search for "recover notepad files" and the first Google result is "How to Recover an Unsaved Notepad File | eHow.com " and then the w

by vaksel 16y ago

yeah those guys are scum Search for "recover notepad files" and the first Google result is "How to Recover an Unsaved Notepad File | eHow.com " and then the whole article is about how you can't recover the file...with 4 adsense links at the end with most having click worthy titles like "recover deleted files" so Google users get screwed, Google advertisers get screwed, and eHow and Google both make a few extra bucks. I'd bet that all these content farms would have been long banned by Google, if they weren't using adsense.

patio11 16y ago
To be fair, I'm very happy with the performance of my ads on their pages. (For better or worse, they rank well for e.g. "How to make a bingo card" and my ads on that page have 400% ROI.) I don't think users get anything by seeing their site before my landing page, though (aside from "frustrated").
- vaksel 16y ago
  well you already outrank them, so maybe you are paying them to get the customers you already got. how much are you spending per click there?
  - patio11 16y ago
    I tend to think that AdWords augments search for generic inquiries and cannibalizes it for brand queries, and I've got data kicking around somewhere here for both of those being true for BCC. (I still bid on brand queries, because I still see positive ROI on them, just not nearly as positive as AdWords thinks. Long story, ask me some day when I'm not due at a conference in 20 minutes.) I seem to have broken the Google AdWords interface and can't get exact data at the moment, but my CPC at content farms ranges from an average of 4 cents to an average of 8 cents. They send some of the highest quality traffic which is not direct from competitor's websites. (I wouldn't have predicted that but, hey, data knows more than I do.)
RBr 16y ago
I think that scum might be a little harsh. Google indexes and makes money (through adsense) on a lot worse things then content farms. However, just like a Torrent site will rarely show up on the Google's first page for a TV show name, their algorithm needs to be adjusted to account for mills that value profit over content.

by vaksel 16y ago

patio11 16y ago

To be fair, I'm very happy with the performance of my ads on their pages. (For better or worse, they rank well for e.g. "How to make a bingo card" and my ads on that page have 400% ROI.) I don't think users get anything by seeing their site before my landing page, though (aside from "frustrated").

vaksel 16y ago
well you already outrank them, so maybe you are paying them to get the customers you already got. how much are you spending per click there?
- patio11 16y ago
  I tend to think that AdWords augments search for generic inquiries and cannibalizes it for brand queries, and I've got data kicking around somewhere here for both of those being true for BCC. (I still bid on brand queries, because I still see positive ROI on them, just not nearly as positive as AdWords thinks. Long story, ask me some day when I'm not due at a conference in 20 minutes.) I seem to have broken the Google AdWords interface and can't get exact data at the moment, but my CPC at content farms ranges from an average of 4 cents to an average of 8 cents. They send some of the highest quality traffic which is not direct from competitor's websites. (I wouldn't have predicted that but, hey, data knows more than I do.)

RBr 16y ago

I think that scum might be a little harsh. Google indexes and makes money (through adsense) on a lot worse things then content farms. However, just like a Torrent site will rarely show up on the Google's first page for a TV show name, their algorithm needs to be adjusted to account for mills that value profit over content.