I wondered how long it would be until we saw this quarterly topic...

It's good to remind those complaining with unprovable figures that they in fact do get a decent deal on average.

unprovable is the best word to describe the great shell game they have going on

Sorry about a double post on this one, but here is another data point:

Revenues up 41%, earnings up 31% - doesn't sound like they're ripping anyone off to me. Now if revenues were up 30% and earnings were up 40%, that would be a different story.

BillyS, you make a good point. I noticed that too but wasn't sure of the significance.

Why is it that so many assume that the reason they aren't doing as well as they would like to is due to some unfair manipulation by Google? Even if Google is playing a shell game, what can we do about it other than complain and feel hard done by? Personally, I find it more effective to concentrate on the factors I CAN control.

79%

On average, Watson, on average!

As noticed every other quarter, we do not know how this value is being calculated, so it is irrelevant at best. We don't know how many sweetheart deals they have, so we should not assume that everyone gets 79%.

Maybe Yotube and other companies owned by Google gets 200% - that would mean a lot smaller percentage for average adsense publishers - who knows?

If anyone is looking for a niche that will likely get a lot of traffic, just put up a site about Google conspiracy theories. You too can profit from threads just like this one.

FarmBoy

I also waited with a lot of interest for those numbers. The first thing I went for in their report was the AdSense income and cost figures.

I agree with zett - they are only talking about AVERAGES. When you get a sub-dollar eCPM, it's cold comfort to know that Google is paying somebody else well to compensate for what they take from your site.

"When you get a sub-dollar eCPM, it's cold comfort to know that Google is paying somebody else well to compensate for what they take from your site. "

When you make a statement like this, you are putting yourself in a victim position. You're saying, "It's Google's fault that I am not earning more than I am." And so you don't consider the factors under YOUR control that could improve things for you--or the factors that lead to your site being a "sub-dollar eCPM" site in the first place, which you may not be able to change. And if that's so, the solution is to create a different site. But that's still something YOU can do.

Of course, if you *prefer* to blame it on Google, that's your prerogative. It just doesn't do you any good.

Of course, if you *prefer* to blame it on Google, that's your prerogative. It just doesn't do you any good.

purplecape - I agree. Actually, I don't blame Google for my poor earnings - they're optimizing their well-being as best they can, so best of luck to them. It's just frustrating to see two things: the lack of alternatives to AdSense and the complete non-transparency of Google when it comes to explaining to us why we make what we make. The latter can only exist in light of the former. Apart from that, I am a free-market kind of guy (I am not calling for regulators or anybody else to step in and tell Google what to do). The problem, however, is that in this specific situation a free and transparent advertising market is exactly what we're lacking.

Maybe Yotube and other companies owned by Google gets 200% - that would mean a lot smaller percentage for average adsense publishers - who knows?

No. The 79% average comes only from the AdSense network sites (which includes only the 3rd party sites like AOL, CNN.com, MySpace, you, me, etc.). The Google-owned sites like YouTube and Orkut are included in a different line item.

I'm relieved to hear that! Yeah, I'd like some more transparency, but whenever I think about it, the kinds of information that I would like to have from Google would benefit black-hat (and gray-hat) types more than it would me. And so if Google provided that information, you and I might be worse off!

So, I operate in the dark. I try things out. I see what works. And I'm patient.

Yeah, but don't 10% of the sites make 90% of the Adsense revenue? What are the actual stats?

There was an article a while back along the lines of advertising dollars go mostly to the top 100 sites.

Which are the only ones allowed to negotiate rates. Which probably means they get a better deal than small publishers. Which would mean our cut is better than 79%...

p/g

It's just frustrating to see two things: the lack of alternatives to AdSense and the complete non-transparency of Google when it comes to explaining to us why we make what we make.

I can understand frustration with the lack of competition, but not this transparancy position.

Knowing Google's operating model, I wouldn't think it would be so easy to explain our share of each click because it probably varies by a lot of factors - and they might consider this a competitive advantage.

Let's face it, one of the reasons for Google's success is that no one completely understands how they do what they do.