Blog Money — April 2007
April 2007 seemed to be a month of decline for most bloggers, with a few exceptions. This was the case for me as well. Although I added a few sources of revenue (such as Kontera, Text-Link-Ads, and ReviewMe), I haven’t reaped the benefits of those services like I should have. However, that has already changed in May.
Paula Mooney wrote a cool post on her blog that features a list of blogger salaries around the blogosphere. At my current pace, I would have been somewhere in the bottom 5 of her list of 60. I’m not sure that’s worth writing home about, but kudos to Paula for assembling the list. Many of us were curious. I’m surprised no one has compiled a list until now.
Observations
It seems as if adding Kontera has taken attention way from my Google AdSense ads. I didn’t make nearly as much as I did from AdSense in March 2007, and therefore considered taking Kontera down. But I did drill down into the issue further. I’ve received roughly the same number of click-throughs, but my eCPM went down. And many big blogs are running both ad services, so why not keep them.
AuctionAds was a little unpredictable as well. I experienced 5-10 day droughts…and all of a sudden a big purchase. Of the 30 days in April, I made money 5 of those days. And oddly enough, 4 of those 5 days were my lowest click-through days. As I mentioned in last week’s Friday’s Finds, Darren Rowse (Problogger.net) wrote a little something about AuctionAds and how it seems niche bloggers really benefit from the service. Derrich.com isn’t a niche blog, per se…although I try to focus on money and investing.
During the last week of April, I activated my Text Link Ads account and added the code where necessary. Stock Trading 101 took advantage of the $100 in FREE Links.
The Results
| Google AdSense: | $49.12 |
| Kontera: | $9.85 |
| AuctionAds: | $12.43 |
| Text Link Ads: | $7.50 |
| Advertising on brohans.com: | ($4.00) |
| TOTAL: | $74.90 |
Moving Forward
I think improving my content will be priority #1 for May…with regard to staying focused on those categories I am passionate about: finance and sports. Although I don’t see myself abandoning any others.
After trying both AuctionAds and Amazon at the bottom of my posts, I’ve decided to try a new strategy suggested by Maki at DoshDosh.com. As of May 1, I began placing the $100 in FREE Text Link Ads banner at the bottom of my posts bringing attention to the fact that I participate in the service. In 8 days, I’ve sold 2 additional ads including one Post Level Ad on this video, which has a PR of 6: The Effects of Drugs and Alcohol on Spiders.
Popularity: 2% [?]
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May 8th, 2007 at 10:10 pm
Have you signed up at Commission Junction to promote affiliate products? I think there are quite a few there that would fit your site very well. Same with ClickBank.
I would also recommend AuctionAds - you would be surprised what you could find on eBay (oooooooohhh, you’d be surprised!!).
Also, you may want to consider AdBrite. I make next to nothing with them in clicks, but I’ve had a couple of advertisers buy ads on my site and they simply pay a flat monthly fee no matter how poorly they write their ads!
(PS - if you haven’t already signed up for these, use my sidebar links!
)
May 9th, 2007 at 8:00 am
Do those post level ads bring a lot of money?
May 9th, 2007 at 8:26 am
@ Wendy: Thanks for the suggestions. I think I’ll keep AuctionAds around. I just need to learn how to tweak the keywords. And I have signed for CJ, just haven’t moved forward.
@ Henry: My PR6 post level sale was $25. See John Chow’s Post Level pricing post.
May 9th, 2007 at 9:13 am
Your statement that you will remain focussed on content and write about subjects you are passionate about is very reassuring.
So many bloggers lose track of these requirements for a successful blog.
- Martin Reed
May 9th, 2007 at 2:29 pm
Do you suggest post level ads?
May 9th, 2007 at 2:51 pm
I definitely receommend it. It’s easy advertising. There is little work involved on your part. All you have to do is download the TLA plugin, insert the code, and make advertisers aware that you are running TLA. They have a number of banners and text links that you can add to your blog to communicate that.
May 9th, 2007 at 8:45 pm
I was a downer on Kontera last month. But after seeing some positive results with them, I’m keeping it on my blog.
May 10th, 2007 at 12:41 pm
Derrich, what kind of CTR are you getting with adsense?
May 10th, 2007 at 1:04 pm
It was about 1.25 in April. Lowest it’s been.
May 14th, 2007 at 9:17 pm
[…] this month’s Blog Money report, I mentioned taking advantage of more sources of revenue. One of those is blog marketing […]
June 4th, 2007 at 12:03 am
[…] months of blogging revenue, I decided to take advantage of more resources available to bloggers. In April 2007, I earned $74.90 primarily from Google […]