Chapter Eighteen

How to Make Money on Google’s Content Network

By Ben Hart

So when should you start running your ads on Google’s Content Network?

Again, this will depend on the kind of product you are selling.  If you are selling the kind of product that is of interest to a more general audience, you have a good chance to make it work for you.

It also depends on how well your ads are working on search engines.  If you are having trouble making your ads work on the Google Search Engine Network, your ads won’t work on Content.

Click-through-rates are always lower (much lower) on Content. And those who do click covert at lower rates also.

My Google ads are working so well that I also run my ads on Google’s Search and Content Network.

I know that the leads I’m getting from the Content Network convert at only half the rate (or less) than the leads I get from Google’s search engine.  But I don’t mind because the leads coming from the Content Network are still plenty profitable.

And I get more traffic from the AdSense sites than I get from the search engines.

If it’s costing me 60 cents to make a $1, I’ll take it.

Sure, I’d prefer to spend 20 cents to make a $1.  But I’ll also trade 60 cents for a $1 all day long.

So for my ad campaigns, both Search Network and Content Network are turned on full bore.

But this is hugely important.

Google lets you set separate maximum bids per click for its Content Network.

If your maximum bid-per-click is $1 on Google, you should start out making your maximum bid on content 10 cents a click and see how that does. 

If you forget to do this, you risk ringing up a big bill fast because the Content Network is so huge.  If your ads on Content Network are doing well, you can ramp up your bids to bring in more traffic . . . gradually.

Google also lets you track Search Nework results and Content results separately.

For my Inner Circle program, the Content Network works fine even though the leads covert to trial members at only about half the rate.

Super Bowl ads are not targeted either.  But they can work for the right product – a product that has broad general appeal.

The Content Network is a little like that.  It’s not as broad as a Super Bowl ad.  But it’s more of a broadcast than the kind of hyper-narrowcasting I favor.

The most cost-effective advertising is always super narrow and targeted.

You are aiming to please a niche.  You are aiming to meet the need of that person who is looking specifically for exactly what you are selling.

Once you’re able to achieve that, branch out from there.  But grab the low-hanging fruit first.

Don’t start by running Super Bowl ads.  And don’t start with the Content Network turned  on – which it is by default.  You need to turn it off to start or you’ll be shocked by your next credit card statement.

Protecting Yourself from Click Fraud

One problem on the Content Network is click fraud.

The reason this is a problem is because the owners of sites in the AdSense program are paid a commission from Google on every AdWords ad that’s running on their site. 

So there is strong incentive for AdSense site owners to engage in click fraud.  Theoretically, a crooked site owner could sit there all day clicking on your ad that’s running on his site and run up your AdWords bill to stratospheric proportions. 

The good news is Google is doing a good job of policing this.  This was a much bigger problem in the old days, not as much of a problem now.

Google is doing a better job everyday of limiting its Content Network to truly good sites.

Sites that Google believes are engaging in click fraud are booted out of the AdSense program.  Google is the world’s expert at tracking people’s activity and behavior on the Internet.  No one is better at this than Google.

Few AdSense site owners want to be banned for life from the AdSense program and risk prison time.

Nevertheless, there is a great tool that will protect you from click fraud and, more importantly,  help you dramatically improve the results of your ads running on the Content Network. It’s called PPSeer – The Content Network Tracker.

You’ll find the tool here: http://www.ppseer.com/

PPSeer tracks the results of your Google Content Network ads site by site.

The reason this is crucial to your success is that Google allows you to say “No” to specific sites. 

Presto!

You can then cherry-pick the AdSense Content Network sites that are delivering results.  You can stop your ads from running on poor performing sites. 

Google also allows you to list the specific sites where you want your ads to appear. Quality sites such as The New York Times, About.com, Wikipedia and many other name-brand information sites are part of Google’s Content Network.

So there really is not much of a reason anymore to hire an ad agency to handle placement of your ads on the Internet.  Google and you can handle most of it.  My latest report shows my ads are running on 10,346 sites on the Content Network. How will an ad agency help me get a bigger, better audience for my ads on the Internet than this?

But I would not do this without PPSeer.

PPSeer is a tracking tool that works a lot like Google’s Conversion Tracker and Analytics. It gives you code you paste on your “thank you” pages for your  sign-up form and “order confirmation”  pages.  And it does not interfere with Google’s Conversion Tracker or Analytics. 

You can have all three tracking tools running at the same time, as I do.

With PPSeer, you can track clicks and see what percentage of clicks from each AdSense site leads to conversions.  PPSeer is an indispensable tool for my Content Network ad campaigns.

Demographic Site Selection

Google now allows you to use demographic criteria when you tell Google what kinds of sites you want your ad to appear on in the Content Network.  Criteria options include age, gender, income, ethnicity, children or no children, subject of interest, and other categories.  Google is always adding more categories to help you more accurately target your ads.  It’s up to you to take advantage of them.

There is, of course, no way Google can accurately know for certain what demographic characteristics describe a particular person who is looking at a computer screen at any one time.

Google makes a best guess at the kind of people who visit a site.

If you are showing your ads on the Content Network, you want to make sure you carefully review what sites your ads are running on. This is another tool that will help you achieve better targeting for your ads.  

Here is how Google describes this tool:

What is demographic site selection?

Demographic site selection is a way to find and run your ads on sites with the right audience for your AdWords campaigns.

A demographic group is an audience that shares a particular trait or characteristic. This trait might be age, gender, income, or some other factor. If your product appeals to young women, for instance, you might want to target sites popular with the female demographic, the 18-24 age demographic, or both.

With the AdWords site tool, you can pick your preferences in up to three different demographic categories. The system will analyze your preferences and create a list of available Google Network sites that are popular with that audience. If you select multiple demographics, the AdWords system will look for sites that match all of your preferences. For instance, you might ask the site tool to look for sites popular with users who have children, or for sites popular with men earning a high income. The site tool will then return a list of sites whose audience tends to match those demographic descriptions.

The demographic site selection option is found on the 'Identify sites' page when you create a new site-targeted campaign, or on the site tool in an existing site-targeted campaign. In both cases you'll also be able to use two other options to find sites: listing site URLs and describing topics that match your ad. We recommend using those methods along with demographic site selection to identify the very best sites for your ad to appear. For more detailed instructions, please see this Help Center entry: How do I use the site tool?

The demographic website data used by AdWords comes from comScore Media Metrix, an Internet audience measurement provider. At this time, AdWords has demographic information on users from the United States only. For this reason, demographic site selection is available only for campaigns which geo-target users in the United States. If your campaign doesn't geo-target the United States, you will not see the demographic option on the site tool.

Please remember that demographic site selection cannot guarantee that your ad will reach only the exact audience you select. Most public websites get a variety of visitors. However, demographic site selection will help you choose sites where you're very likely to find the people you want to reach.

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