******
That seems we share a common practice of AS, more SE traffic resulted in drastic drop in EPC, look like AS doesn't like SE traffic, though over 90% are from Google itself ... :P

I am going to try to show only AS codes to repeated traffic only.

I am going to try to show only AS codes to repeated traffic only.

Depending on what kind of site that sure sounds like a bad idea...

******
Now if that is already very bad, is there anything a bad idea?

For the worst, I am ready and not surprise to completely remove AS codes from my site some months later if that is the trend Google *** ASSIGNED *** to my site .... :P

[edited by: GoldenHammer at 12:25 pm (utc) on Sep. 21, 2006]

Alternatively you could have been mostly funded by a particular advertiser who was being overcharged and had to give up adwords (happened to me, as a publisher. Gee that was a good few months! I felt sorry for the advertiser as I track clicks and I could see they were paying 3 times the price of everyone else)

There are lots of reasons that are characteristics of how adsense works, and you can't always do anything about it beyond finding another niche to expand to.

A section about hardware reviews might be a good place for affiliate links to a high-spec PC manufacturer. A travel section might do well with affiliate links to hotel booking sites. A fashion site might do well with affiliate links to online boutiques.

If you're unhappy with AdSense, try some pay-per-action advertisers on your site. You can run them alongside AdSense units, so long as they aren't contextual.

[edited by: UserFriendly at 2:13 pm (utc) on Sep. 21, 2006]

...hard work getting my site indexed fully, ...which was doing all right for me before, a few hundred a month) only to see it plummet after all the hard work

Maybe this will help.

My Rules of Adsense:
1)The first Rule of adsense is Don't talk about adsense. Family, Friends and people on their death beds ARE included.

2) Content is King! Unique, useful, quality content will always win in the long run. Always add new content on a regular basis.

3) Diversify your revenue - Don't just rely on Google. If you can, add other revenue streams to your site like Affiliates, etc.

4) Diversify your audience/advertisers - I'm sorry to say but if I had only one site like many of you I would have a hard time sleeping at night. By having multiple sites that have nothing to do with each other, I don't really care if one site goes down he toilet. Let me re-phrase that, I do care, but I can still eat and pay my rent.

5) Sample Correctly - To make your "few hundred a month" if you are doing so with high traffic and low ctr then go ahead and apply rule #3 AFTER you have applied rule #4. If you are making that money with low traffic and a good CTR then your sample is not big enough for you to accurately predict anything. Buy some quality traffic if you have to.

6) Relax! - It's a roller coaster ride so expect that what goes up will come down again before going back up and down... That could mean smartpricing, a sudden drop in SE traffic, a change in your niches' industry, advertisers lowering their bids, seasonal traffic, advertisers faith in adwords, competition from other PPC, etc. Don't waste too much time with SEO tactics or trying to circumvent smartpricing as there are too many variables that you cannot control. If you've applied rule #2, #3 & #4 well, you will barely feel the blow.

What plummeted, your eCPM or your actual dollars earned, or both?

If you don't convert for your advertisers yuo get a cut in pay.

I used to have adblocks on my index page on a free download site and got uber smart priced. The visitors were so interested in the free downloads I offer they would click on the home page ads and look but just briefly, not long enough for a conversion. Took me a while to figure that out.

So if you index has Adsense on it and is not "sticky" and people are going somewhere else deeper for what you offer I would take it off.

IMHO