Adsense vs. Affiliate

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I have done some testing and it seems adsense is better. The reason why is because it requires very little action fomr the visitor. Just click a link and you get paid. No preselling ,no cloaking links, no redirects, no landing pages.


On the downside you have a higher risk of getting kicked off Adsense than with an affiliate network.

Peopel talk about the so called big payouts with affilaite offers...$20!1!! lead 0MGG!! but shit if they converted so well why would people use adsense in the first place?
 


Hey!

However, then you have to see well.... how much is this click going to give me? um... 0.20 - 0.60$ MAX (if that). However, and affiliate sale will get you anywhere from 65 - 90$ if you are doing hosting as an example.

So .60 ( per click) = 150 Clicks = $90.00 -- You can convert say umm 2 out of those 150 you have saved yourself ALOT of time and tons of traffic for $180... it just works out better its more profitable.
 
It's not a zero sum proposition and there's no one right answer for every site. The kind of money I see working with companies who use affiliate offers far exceeds what those same companies make from AdSense. At the same time I see a lot of smaller or medium sized (or community based) sites that probably - just a guess - wouldn't make back their investment from trying to content manage affiliate offers instead of just slapping adsense up. But just because that's what I've seen doesn't make it true for everyone, and, more importantly (as I said above), it's not a zero sum game. Both AdSense AND affiliate offers can have their place in your online marketing mix.

All that being said, you are completely limited in what you do with respect to AdSense and while I know that some people make a ton of money with it, I have to assume that most of the people making in the 5-6 figure range per month are making most of that money either from list management activities of some kind, contractual arrangements on a CPM basis or by using affiliate offers in one way or another (or many ways) even if they are making plenty of money with AdSense. You can build affiliate offers into offer paths, co-registration paths, email offers, natural content, interstitials, banner campaigns - almost anything. With AdSense you've got your AdSense text ads and that's that.
 
Why do cars come in so many colors?

Because one color doesnt fit everyone. Same with marketing some people will claim that Arbitrage is the best, some will say affiliate marketing. Its really a personal preference. I do know as someone who uses google for PPC i will not take traffic from the content network (adsense) which a lot of people do as well which is why the payouts are usually low, per click.

Offers that payout over $30 usually are sale based offers where it requires a credit card to purchase a service or product. Most people stick to the lead based offers because they require less commitment from the consumer but the advertiser gets something they can work with. Lead based offers also convert much higher and typically have a better ROI as people are still afraid to buy online, but it is getting better in recent years.
 
I don't know I say use both, simply because on a few of my sites I cannot find any relevent affiliate products to advertise with so I'm really forced over to using adsence, but on my other sites I've got lots of things to advertise so I back off with adsence.

The overall goal in my eye's is not to scare away your visitors with too many advertisements, making my visitors think I'm there to give them valuable information and not make money off them works better then worrying about which advertising to use.
 
Affiliate stuff and contextual ads each have their place - and often that place is even on the same page.

I would never put up an affiliate banner graphic. They generally don't convert well at all - and certainly not better than contextual or CPM ads in the same spot would. But on a page that has banner spots (CPM or Adsense/YPN) and useful, carefully placed affiliate links (along with other revenue streams), you can really get the most revenue possible without a sea of flashing, ugly ads.

Try to think of ads in terms of value to your user. It's *is* possible to make ads useful if you think in terms of filling the needs and wants of your 'customers.'

However, when used appropriately, affiliate stuff works really well. You just need to be creative. I don't do any CPA fill-in type offers because in my main niche, these don't do well (shopping stuff does well, though). You just have to find what's right for you.

Laura :)
 
In my experience, adsense tends to work better on non-product-specific pages, and affiliate works better on more specic targeted pages.
 
I have just recently started using adsense, I mainly make my money from affiliate programs. One sale may make me $175.00 and with adsense one click might make me pennies or a couple of dollars.
 
Sorry to bring up an old topic but this was a good question I felt I needed to answer.

Basically, it depends on your site. What is the keyword focus of the page you are considering placing adsense on? Take that keyword and go to ADWORDS and see what the going rate is on that keyword. If you see $1+ for that term, you'll probably make some excellent coin with adsense.

If you find that the term's top bid is lower than 50 pennies, you need to go with an affiliate program because you'll more than likely make way more.

For me, I obviously do both. It totally depends on the market you are in. I have sites that make $3 per 100 clicks with adsense and others that make $3 a click.

Bottom line, as with anything else, do your research.
 
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Laura said:
Affiliate stuff and contextual ads each have their place - and often that place is even on the same page.

I would never put up an affiliate banner graphic. They generally don't convert well at all - and certainly not better than contextual or CPM ads in the same spot would. But on a page that has banner spots (CPM or Adsense/YPN) and useful, carefully placed affiliate links (along with other revenue streams), you can really get the most revenue possible without a sea of flashing, ugly ads.

Try to think of ads in terms of value to your user. It's *is* possible to make ads useful if you think in terms of filling the needs and wants of your 'customers.'

However, when used appropriately, affiliate stuff works really well. You just need to be creative. I don't do any CPA fill-in type offers because in my main niche, these don't do well (shopping stuff does well, though). You just have to find what's right for you.

Laura :)
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I generally look at affiliate banners as free photos. Even when the same product is in several banners on a page, people seem to click on a text link anyways.:D

Conversion almost always come from the text links also.
 
I started out with adsense...then started to test affiliate and learn as much as I could about AM ~ I've already made 7x more with affiliate stuff then I did with adsense. Also, as I improve with AM my ROI gets better and get bigger jumps in ROI improvement with AM then adsense.

I now prefer AM but adsense does have its place and even though what I do with it right now is almost nothing I do plan on bringing it back in some campaigns.

I've also have learned a lot more from AM then when I was using adsense (abri) ~ I also had to get out of the arbi mind set that tended to make me numb to everything else thinking all I needed to do is...automate/scrape/100s of pages that I never personally look at.

Apple D said:
I use copeac and only ONE offer pays more than $30 which is the shit v0000nage one which is a 7 page signup form.
Click to expand...
Meh...I see more than one $30+ payout on Copeac and besides...it's about conversion and if you chase only high payouts I personaly think one will be disappointed.
 
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