Amazon.com is currently running a new program in Beta called Context Links. This looks like it is going to be an excellent tool to help webmasters increase revenue from their websites.

Context links are very similar to google adsense ads in that you place a snippet of code on your website, amazon reads the page, understands what it is about, and displays products that are relevant.

This is a significant development for several reasons. First off you, as a webmaster, no longer do you have to worry about amazon products going out of stock. It can be a lot of work going over your products and replacing all the code for the products no longer in stock at amazon.com. Context ads solve this problem. It will display only up to date products.

A second big benefit is that you can very specifically gain from the massive intelligence that amazon is gathering about its customers. Do you get email from amazon? Do you log into their site often? Ever notice how the main page changes based on your browsing and shopping habits? They have gathered information from you and from millions of other shoppers and this means they know what might be of interest to you. You can leverage this intelligence by using context ads. Now when you create a content page you can let amazon figure out what products would best be sold within that page.

A third benefit is that this will actually offer your web visitor a better shopping experience. Let me explain. You are a webmaster and that means you probably have some expertise in the subject area of your website. But do you know everything? Do you know about all the most popular products in your subject? Of course you don’t. There are too many things to know and too little time in the day. But Amazon knows. And they will display these things in context ads. You leverage their intelligence to your gain (and their gain).

Extraordinary Control over what is displayed

There is one significant thing about context links that make them very attractive and better. This is that you as the webmaster are given quite a lot of control. They give you all the usual Amazon type controls that you are probably already familiar with such as size, color, look and layout. But there is one extra level of control that will have a significant impact on how well context ads do on your site. That is the ability to mark, with some simple html, exactly which portions of your page you want to be analyzed or not analyzed for the content ad placement. This is a tremendous tool for you as a webmaster. It will allow you to finely tune what you want them to place on your page.

Context Ads are currently in Beta and I am not sure how wide they are offering it to their affiliates but if you have an affiliate account log in and check to see if you have access to it. I recommend you start using and testing it right away! If you have a website and are not an affiliate of Amazon.com I highly recommend you sign up! This looks like it could be a very successful tool that will significantly impact your click through rates.

About the author: Will Kalif , For more Creative Webmastering Information from the Author visit his website at: The Creative Webmaster – Forging the Iron of Creativity on the Anvil of a Website
If you are a beginner to Webmastering or really want to learn how to do it visit his totally free tutorials for beginners at: How to make a website that you love and that makes you money

• 0 comments »

Many people have started using Google's AdSense program, but there are some who find it a bit too uncertain or simply not suiting their own requirements from an ad program.

But thankfully for such people, there are many alternatives to AdSense which attempt to alleviate some of its shortcomings. Here is a list of the most noteworthy ones from the lot with a description concerning each one.

AllFeeds (http://www.allfeeds.com/?action=publishers) AllFeeds has a great pool of online advertisers to choose from. It also features many display formats that you can choose from. These include banners, buttons, XML feeds, DHTML pop-ups and so on. It also features real time reporting of your ad status. The site will mail a check every month, provided that you earn more then $25.00, while rolling over earnings for the next month if you don't. Another interesting thing about AllFeeds is that it integrates with Google AdSense, maximizing your earnings with AdSense.

MarketBanker (http://www.marketbanker.com/mb/sell.php) MarketBanker allows you the unique possiblity to set the pricing for your site. It also allows you to allow or reject any link that appears on your site (although AdSense itself does a very good job of this as well, with URL filters) There's also a statistics section which will allow you to see how well your site is doing. The ads are small just like AdSense's and they're just as easy to set up. Also, registration for MarketBanker is free.

BidClix ( http://www.bidclix.com/PubTop.html) BidClix is different because it has advertisers compete for clicks on your site, which in turn is meant to generate the highest possible profits for your page. It also has a very large pool of advertisers which ensure there are plenty of people to choose your site. However, it does require more polish on site contents then AdSense. As most sites, real time statistics are available and its very easy to get started with this service, but it's also very flexible.

Chitika (http://www.realcontext.com/index.php?option=RealContext:+Contextual+Targeting+Engine) RealContext uses Artificial intelligence to retrieve the most relevant ads for your page. And there's an extra feature which makes RealContext unique as well. Keywords are selected based upon which previous selections payed off and which didn't. That means there's a constant feedback process that ensures you gain better revenue from your ads. It also supports blocking certain adds and child-safe filtering and many more options.

AdHearus (http://adhearus.com/webmaster.php) AdHearus is a very feature-packed contextual ad provider. As with AdSense, advertisements are targeted but it doesn't stop here at all. The ads are very flexible, you can select from text-ads, banners, rectangles, pop-ups, pop-unders or skyscrapers. You can also display your own ads, through rotation, both on your site and on other affiliate sites, which makes AdHearus a hybrid with conventional advertising technologies. There's a very comprehensive on-line real time reporting feature and, as usual with such services, starting out is free and it's a breeze.

AffiliateSensor (http://www.affiliatesensor.com/) AffiliateSensor has highly customizable ad blocks, which you can make for yourself with an easy to use on-line interface. You also get realtime reporting with clicks-by-domain, page and refferer. There's integration with Google AdSense as well, through the google_alternate_ad_url so AffiliateSensor can be used as a substitute for Google PSA's (Public Service Ads).

Kanoodle Bright Ads (http://www.kanoodle.com/about/brightads.cool) Kanoodle's offering allows publishers to get ads related to topics or segments, and not the traditional keyword oriented ads. The site also groups publisher sites with advertisers by hand to ensure high-revenue generating ads. And speaking of revenue, the amount of money you receive is a clear 50% share of the amount of money Kanoodle recieves for an advertiser.

TargetPoint (http://publisher.targetpoint.com) TargetPoint is oriented more towards content publishers. It offers full control over the look the ads, statistics over your site's overall performance and better revenue. It's free to register and you earn a guaranteed 60% of the total revenue. You can get payed with Paypal of Bank checks and (most times) wire transfers as well.

Clicksor (http://www.clicksor.com) Clicksor will earn you as much as 60% from the amount of money your website produces. What you get is about the same as AdSense, there are targeted text ads, you can view the revenues from your website in real time. You can receive money via PayPal or through a check every two weeks, provided that you have earned more then $50. If you haven't made that much, your earning roll over to the next period

Bidvertiser (http://www.bidvertiser.com/) Like AdSense, Bidvertiser displays text ads in your page. But the difference lies in the fact that advertisers bid over your advertising space, ensuring you earn as much revenue as you possibly can. This also means that bids will increase over time, earning you even more cash. You also get a great way to customize your ads with a very easy to use tool and detailed reports on your site's status.

Quigo AdSonar (http://www.quigo.com/adsonarpublishers.htm) Quigo AdSonar achieves relevancy by placing a filter according to your site's categories. It also offers you on-line reports of your site's status and the possibility to add your own custom ads replacing ads that don't gain you any revenue. The setup is very simple, in a similar fashion to AdSense's and quite customizable as well.

Vibrant Media IntelliTXT (http://www.intellitxt.com/site/web_01a.html) Vibrant Media IntelliTXT offers user-activated ads, highlighting certain words within the content of the page and presenting relevant ads when a user hovers his mouse over them. It uses a pay-for-performance pricing scheme and can easily be used along with other advertising methods, because it is unobtrusive. It places you in full control, allowing you to easily integrate it within your site with some simple JavaScript.

Nixie (http://www.nixxie.com/display.php?section=Partners) Nixie claims to hold a technology that can read and understand your site, enabling it to display the most relevant content to your site. Besides text ads, Nixie also features price comparison listings as well as live auction advertising. It's very easy to implement and has a good payment policy as well.

MIVA AdRevenue Xpress (http://www.miva.com/us/content/partners/arx.asp) MIVA AdRevenue Xpress is targeted towards small and mid-sized publishers. It implements Search Box functionality and also features things like a Category Directory as well as the handling of 404 error pages. It can be integrated with your page using a simple on-line wizard.

Fastclick (http://www.fastclick.com/publish.html) Fastclick offers you an impressive 65 percent of what it makes from a click on your website. Payments are done monthly, via PayPal or through checks. The ads can be formatted as you wish, and Fastclick even offers a free support serice for its members and no fees are required to register with the service.

contextWeb ContextAd (http://www.contextweb.com/Corporate/publisher/publisher.shtml) ContextAd offers the possibility of contextual ads for dynamic pages, meaning ads will change as soon as your page does. It's very easy to use and free to sing up for and offers a transparent payment policy. The ads are fully customizable and real-time reports are available 24/7.

AdBrite (http://www.adbrite.com/) AdBrite offers publishers the possibility of integrating text ads in their pages. These are done on your own rates, with the websites you approve by hand so it bares some similarities with a classic advertising scheme. You also have the option of adding a "Your Add Here" button that buyers can immediately click to ad space on your page. It can also be used in conjunction with Google AdSense, maximizing your CTR and offering advertisers the possibility of showing their links in your Google AdSense space. You have full control over the look and feel of your adds and finally, you get an incredible 75% of what the advertiser pays for on every click.

So, as you can see there are many offers for this kind of advertising, and many hybrids based on AdSense like advertising. Also, a lot of services can work together with AdSense to earn you an even greater amount of revenue for your ad space.

You need to have optimized niche website templates for best results. You may find the best adsense templates and blog templates at www.AdsenseTemplates.com (http://www.adsensetemplates.com). They are offering 100 fresh new templates every month.

About the author: John Ugoshowa. For more information about affiliate marketing see the affiliate marketing section of The Free Ad Forum.

Digg this - Post to del.icio.us - Post to Furl

• 2 comments »

What is the Yahoo Publisher Network program and why should I try it over advertising programs like Google AdSense? The new Yahoo Publisher Network, also known as the YPN program has proven it is a major competitor to AdSense. Lots of people have been raving about the greatly increased profits from the new Yahoo Advertising Network. They offer a similar setup to Google but with some mild differences and evolving tools.

Now, getting accepted into the Yahoo Publisher Network is somewhat difficult at this time. It is still in Beta testing and many publishers who apply often wait many weeks before they get a response (or do not get a response at all). However, the program is expected to come out of its Beta testing sometime in the coming months and then getting accepted into the program will be much easier. You may be asking yourself, why should I leave AdSense and join the Yahoo Publisher Network when so many people have had so much success with the Google AdSense Program and the YPN program is still new? The answer to this question is simple. So far, many people who have been accepted into this program and have experimented with it, have found that it generally tends to pay more to publishers than the Google AdSense program does; however, many speculate that this may only be for a limited time only in an effort to generate “buzz” about the program and to encourage more webmasters to become interested and apply to the program.

The features of the Yahoo Publisher Network are very similar to that of the AdSense program. Publishers can choose from a wide variety of advertisement layouts and choose ones that they feel best complement their website. Publishers can also change the color scheme of all advertisements to blend the ads with their website so that they look more natural. Like the AdSense program, Yahoo Publisher Network users can have multiple channels so that they can use one account for a large number of websites.

If you are considering choosing the Yahoo Publisher Network program, you must get rid of AdSense advertisements on that website. Yahoo Publisher Network states that you can not run two different contextual advertising programs on one website if you choose the program. Hence, I recommend running the Yahoo Publisher Network advertisements on your website for a certain length of time and see how they perform. If the YPN advertisements perform better than the AdSense advertisements, than you should obviously use the YPN program. On the flip side, if you were making more money using the AdSense program, then stick with AdSense. For some people, this new program may work very well, and for others, they may find that using YPN advertisements lead to a decrease in earnings. Either way, the only way you can know for sure is if you experiment so apply and see what happens. You really don’t have much to lose.

About the author: Liam Fox, Read more about YPN Review
Article © SEO Crawl

Digg this - Post to del.icio.us - Post to Furl

• 1 comments »

CPA is an acronym or short for Cost Per Action or Cost Per Acquisition. The term CPA is not new. If you browse through the Search Engines using the keyword phrase "cost per action" or "cost per acquisition" you will find numerous websites with CPA related articles dating from 2001 - over 5 years ago.

In a nutshell, CPA is a performance based online advertising payment system in which payment is based solely on qualifying actions such as a lead, a sale or registration. In other words, merchants/advertisers determine what actions they want to reward and how much they are willing to pay for those actions.

Lead, Conversion or Registration

The actions defined in a CPA or Cost Per Action agreement relate directly to some type of conversion, with leads, sales and registrations among the most common and does not include deals based solely on clicks such as AdSense, which are referred to specifically as cost-per-click or CPC.

The definition of a Lead, Conversion or Registration can vary from one CPA Affiliate Network to another.

A lead or conversion may simply be considered to be no more than a website visitor providing his/her name and eMail address.

In another example, to be considered a lead or conversion, a website visitor may need to complete and submit a 1 page or 2 page application form. In this example, the product in question may be a home loan or payday loan. But it does not matter to the publisher whether the applicant gets the loan or not or has to wait 30 days before they get an answer from the lender. Once the visitor has completed the desired or contractual action, the publisher has earned a commission.

In another example, a lead or conversion may simply be achieved by a website visitor completing a small website form and paying a small $postage fee via a credit card for the advertised product to be sent to their mailing address.

What all this means is that publishers i.e. website owners, get paid not on how many times an ad is seen or even on how many times it's clicked, but according to how many people click on it and take the action specified by the advertiser on his/her site.

Comparison of CPA Affiliate Programs with Cost Per Click or Cost Per Sale Website Monetization Models

CPA Affiliate Programs are very similar to other popular website monetization models whereby a publisher takes advantage of the arbitrage opportunities between low cost traffic and high paying contextual ads or products paying high affiliate commissions.

In one Scenario low cost pay-per-click or other traffic is driven to a website or landing page displaying high paying contextual ads. When someone clicks on the low cost pay-per-click ad, they then get referred to the website or landing page. If that same someone then clicks on a high paying contextual ad, the publisher earns a commission.

In another Scenario low cost pay-per-click or other traffic is driven to a website advertising high paying affiliate products or directly to the advertiser's own website. When someone clicks on the low cost ad, they then get referred to the Product page(s). If that same someone then orders and pays for a product the publisher will have earned an affiliate commission.

The subtle difference between the first scenario and the second scenario is that in scenario 1 the publisher gets paid with a % of the value of the click regardless of whether the visitor purchased the end product or not. In scenario 2 the publisher only gets paid if the click resulted in a Sale. In CPA (Cost-Per-Action) Affiliate Programs the publisher gets paid if the click resulted in a lead.

CPA Affiliate Network

Before you can engage in a CPA Affiliate Program you will need to apply for affiliate membership in one or more of the 50+ CPA Affiliated Network Companies. All applications are stringently reviewed before they are approved.

Once your application is approved there are essentially 7 simple steps to start generating profits:

1. Find the ultimate high paying, high quality CPA Campaigns to advertise;

2. Identify appropriate Keywords;

3. Register your Domain, prepare and upload your Landing Page;

4. Set up super Low Cost P-P-C Advertising Test campaigns;

5. Monitor and Identify Profitable Test campaigns;

6. Turn Profitable Test Campaigns into fully-fledged Campaigns;

7. Rinse and Repeat;

CPA Affiliate Programs can work well with any type of advertising or traffic generation but are especially extremely profitable when undertaken with a pay-per-click advertising program.

Caution - CPA Affiliate Programs are very profitable and are currently fashionable. All Internet marketers should start looking at CPA Affiliate Programs but before they engage in this activity they should make sure that they have read and fully understand pay-per-click advertising.

About the author: Stephen S Alison is a retired "bean counter" who spent 26 years in middle management positions for major US financial institutions in Europe and a further 10 years as an adviser/consultant to a number of European financial institutions. He owns and operates a number of "hand built" niche websites including: http://www.1clickflipping.com and CPA Affiliate Programs

Digg this - Post to del.icio.us - Post to Furl

• 1 comments »

In Part 1 of this article, we looked at the various pay for performance advertising models offered by Yahoo! Search Marketing. In this article, we will look at the remaining pay for performance search engine models on our list, starting with Google AdWords. Google AdWords™ Similar to Yahoo! Sponsored Search, Google AdWords https://adwords.google.com/ gives web site owners the ability to promote their site when particular keyword or key phrase searches are conducted at Google and their partner sites. Your ads usually appear on the right side of results pages in a "call out" box under the heading "Sponsored Links". Your AdWords text or image ads appear on search result pages for the keywords you buy, and can be targeted by language and country. With Google AdWords' cost-per-click (CPC) pricing, you pay only when a customer clicks on your ad, regardless of how many times it's shown. Google adjusts your bids automatically to keep you ahead of your competition at the lowest possible price. Google Adwords results appear on Google search results pages, Google's distribution partner sites, Google Gmail, and numerous content sites which are syndicated through the Google Adsense program. For more information on Google AdWords, Click Here: https://adwords.google.com/. Google AdSense™ Google AdSense is a way for webmasters to generate income from their sites by displaying text or image advertisements from companies participating in the Google AdWords program. You can display targeted advertising for your content pages or you can add a Google search box to your site and show targeted ads on search results pages. When visitors click on these ads, Google pays you a fee. The ads are targeted to the content already on your page so they are not as intrusive to your visitors. For more information on Google AdSense, Click Here: https://www.google.com/adsense/. LookSmart LookListings™ The LookSmart Directory http://www.looksmart.com/ originally offered a Paid Submission model and then transformed it into a Pay For Performance model, removing their Express Submit directory submission service and receiving a lot of criticism in the process. To have your site included in LookSmart.com, you must pay a per click fee when visitors click on your listing, similar to the Yahoo! Search Submit Express model. The "relevancy keywords", title and description chosen during the set up of your listing determine when your site appears for searches. There is no free submission option to Looksmart and the only way to get your site into their directory is to either pay for their LookListings or submit your site via the Zeal directory http://www.zeal.com, which is only an option available to non-profit sites. LookSmart LookListings work like this: 1) Create Your Listing which includes: - site description & title - relevancy keywords (for keyword targeted listings) - directory category 2) Set Your Monthly Budget: - set your maximum monthly budget - set your maximum click rates for each URL (for keyword targeted listings) - your account is debited USD 0.15 per click (for inclusion-targeted listings) - minimum account deposit totaling your maximum monthly budget - each campaign has a minimum monthly budget of USD 15 3) Account Management - traffic reporting - automatic monthly account refills (from your nominated credit card) - adjust your budget - update description, title and relevancy keywords - bids monitored automatically (for keyword targeted listings) LookListings appear on sites across the LookSmart Network including LookSmart, Lycos, Mamma.com and CNET Search. For more information on LookSmart LookListings, Click Here: http://listings.looksmart.com/help/faq.jhtml?showFaq=new. Other Pay-Per-Click Providers Apart from the big players, there are a large number of other medium-sized search providers selling pay-per-click search advertising. These include: - FindWhat http://www.findwhat.com/ - Enhance (formerly ah-ha) http://www.enhance.com/ - Kanoodle http://www.kanoodle.com/ - Espotting http://www.espotting.com/ - 7Search http://www.7search.com/ - GoClick http://www.goclick.com/ - ePilot.com http://www.epilot.com/ - Lycos Insite AdBuyer http://insite.lycos.com/ - Mirago http://www.mirago.com/ - Search123 http://search123.com/ Of course there are hundreds more PPC engines, many of which can be found via the sites listed in our Further Reading section below. Don't be afraid to set-up some test pay per click campaigns to dip your toes into the paid advertising waters. You don't have to have a large budget to reap rewards, just a willingness to experiment and apply what you learn to improve your campaigns. What you do with all your extra traffic is up to you! Further Reading Pay Per Click Search Engines (CPC / PPC) http://searchenginewatch.com/links/article.php/2156291 Pay Per Click Search Engines on Pandia http://www.pandia.com/optimization/ppc.html Pay Per Click Search Engines on Search Engine Guide http://www.searchengineguide.com/payperclick.html PayPerClickSearchEngines.com http://www.payperclicksearchengines.com/other-pay-per-click-search-engines.shtml Buying Your Way In: Search Engine Advertising Chart http://searchenginewatch.com/webmasters/article.php/2167941 Pay Per Click Analyst http://www.payperclickanalyst.com/ Pay Per Click Guide http://www.payperclickguide.com/ About the author: Kalena Jordan. As well as running her own SEO business Web Rank (www.webrank.biz), Kalena Jordan manages Search Engine College (www.searchenginecollege.com), an online training institution offering instructor-led short courses and downloadable self-study courses in Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing subjects. Copyright © 2005 by Kalena Jordan. All rights reserved under U.S. and international law.

• 0 comments »

A 52 year old webmaster from the Netherlands got banned from the Google Adsense program in just a few clicks. He went looking around for alternatives and found a lot of very creative brand new advertising solutions. That webmaster was me. Do as I did and you will get a message like: * Your account is disabled because of invalid clicks. What was all the fuzz about? The adsense account was set up for my website www.wereldwijdbellen.nl , wich I started one year earlier as an affiliate for a German / American Voip company (voice over IP, internettelephony). At that time Adsense was new for me and I decided to give it a try. Doing some cutting, copying and pasting with the codes and voila, I was advertising competing Voip companies on my website. Spyware was already a big nuisance on the internet at that time. In my battle against it I experimented with anonymous surfing via so called anonymizers and proxyservers with the purpose of hiding my IP address. Simply just out of curiosity, whether or not the number of clicks on my ads could be influenced, I produced them and guess what happened? They were interpreted as invalid clicks. Adsense disabled my account and I have to admit it : they had a good reason to do so (stupid me, what a shame). However It was never my intention to harm the advertisers nor anyone else. * I realised that the possibility to earn money with these ads had gone forever. For hardworking affiliate webmasters, generating 100% of their multiple website income through Adsense, this must be a nightmare. Google has no obligation to explain its decision in detail. So I begged to Google: Here are my sincere apologies. I'll never do it again pleas let me in again !!! No way, don't waste your time, forget about it, don't pull on a dead horse. Google won't unlock your account again. Remember we live in the internet age and everything is automated. Google's answers to my sincere and arguing emails were no exception. They were completely robotized. So would this be the end of a dream earning an income with my website? Answer: NO. As the famous Dutch football player Johan Cruyff ones stated: * Every disadvantage has its advantage. I decided that I had to forget about Adsense forever being an internet advertising possibility for me and guess what I found out ? I was not the only one and this nightmare of the possibility of getting banned is discussed in forums all over the internet now. You want proof? Just google (yes this is a new verb) with "banned from adsense" and you will see. But what is more important is that the alternatives are given in these forums and on individual sites as well. Here I'am going to share with you what I discovered. Clickbank-ad-sense-script, a new program that serves Clickbank based affiliate products in your website. These ads resemble adsense ads but a lot of webmasters are preferring them. Unlike pay per click this program pays for every sale you make in over 11,000 Clickbank products. The yield is higher than adsense because it pays you between 50 and 75% of product cost, wich can mean $ 100 in your pocket from only one click. Clickbank-ad-sense lets you make a selection of your favorite products that you believe are not competing with your own product. Similar programs are: AffiliateSensor and CBPlugin. * You want more money making advertising solutions? Just read on. Another creative way of adding something new is done by Chitika. Their eMiniMall is a CPC-based intelligent product merchandising service. Alternative to static web banner ads it combines product merchandising, a recommandation engine and comparative shopping. Go to Chitika.com and have a look for yourself. One picture says more then a thousand words. * There are pros and cons and every rose has its thorn but what do you think of this one? Adbrite sells ad space on thousands of websites. There are two things you can do with Adbrite - buy and sell ad space. If you are an advertiser they provide you with all sorts of websites. When you find the site you want to advertise on, you write your ad and pay. If approved by the webmaster your ad will appear on that site at the scheduled time. If you are a publisher you can set your own rates and approve or reject every ad that's purchased for your site. The revenue is split 75/25 in your favour. Adbrite provides publishers with more revenue and better ads by selling the ads directly to your visitors - this is something the other ad systems don't do. * The pay-per-click contextual advertising has grown into a $ 3 billion business. Thanks to Google's Adsense network contextual advertising, with the short text based links that appear next to a website's content, is a very hot item on the internet now. Steve Balmer recently introduced Microsoft's version called Adcenter and Yahoo unveiled a pay-per-click beta program called Yahoo Publisher Network (YPN). Let me give you my impressive "competitors" list that I have found in my search to survive my ban from Adsense : adbrite, adcenter (beta), adengage, adgenta, adhearus, adsclick, affiliatesensor, allfeeds, bannerboxes, bidclix, bidvertiser, cbadwords, cbplugin, chitika, clicksaddirect, clicksor, contextweb, expoactive, fastclick, infograbber, intellitxt, kanoodle, mirago , miva, nixxie, quigo, revenuepilot, targetpoint, yahoo ypn. About the author:Bert Colijn, a chemical engineer in the Netherlands for the major part of his life, has turned himself into an enthusiastic internet marketeer. For example ads on how to get increased website traffic with adsense altenatives visit his website, http://www.browseandclick.com/adsense-alternatives.htm

• 0 comments »

Since Google announced their revenue-sharing Adsense program in mid-2003, Internet marketers and other webmasters alike have embraced the program wholeheartedly. For content-heavy, non-commercially oriented sites, Adsense revenue is a welcome way to help defer hosting and other costs of running their sites. For marketers, Adsense is yet another revenue stream to add to pages that may already contain affiliate links, info products, and so on. For many marketers, Adsense was the first time they realized that they could make money from pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, rather than just spend money on it! But there are other PPC search engines who are willing to share their revenues with webmasters who place ads on their sites. For example, Searchfeed has been in business since late 2000, and RevenuePilot has offered revenue-sharing since July of 2002. In addition, the availability of PPC programs has made it possible for many smaller PPC engines to set up shop. Of course, you should always know who you're doing business with, so be sure to learn what you can about the company and who's running it before you do business in a big way with them. It's true that payouts from Google's Adsense program are generally higher than from other PPC engines. That's not always true, of course, but it generally seems to be the case. The smaller PPCs do have some unique advantages of their own, that aren't found with Adsense. For example, most PPC engines will let you recruit affiliates and pay you an override on their earnings. Granted, it's not much, but with enough affiliates it can add up. Adsense only offers javascript display, while some other PPCs offer javascript and XML feeds, as well as real-time search results from a search box. Most PPCs will also tell you how much a click will pay you, while Adsense is very secretive about total earned, payout percentage, etc. In short, for the sake of diversifying your sources of revenue, take a closer look at the other PPCs for some of your sites. About the author:ccng

• 0 comments »