As we head into May, it’s once again time to look at the previous month’s income. Once again, only the actual numbers:
Adsense – $76.50
Paid Advertising – $37.30
Commission Junction – $26.80
Kontera – $.04
Link XL – $2.50
Chitika – $.11
Infolinks – $.72
Grand Total – $143.97
So, this was either my most successful month, or a setback on a couple of fronts. Let’s look at it.
First, My Adsense went down from its record $100+ last month, which is slightly disappointing, but it still topped $75, and that means I’ll be getting a check in July of some type, as it has to be over $100 at the beginning of the month to receive payment.
Second, my paid advertising went up, but I lost my page rank. Of course, y’all know that I have said that I think other things are more important than page rank, and one of those is money. Now, how long the paid advertisers will stick around on a site with no PR will be interesting, but we’ll see as time goes by.
The Commission Junction payment should have actually been in March, if you remember the March statistics report, but it didn’t get recorded until April. So, April could have been the monster month, but then April would have shrunk drastically and I might have been crying like a little girl, so I’ll take what I can get.
Also, it’s the first full month with Infolinks, and though it doubled what it was last month, I’m thinking this type of contextual advertising just might not be the boon it was advertised as being. Luckily, it’s not on this blog anymore, only on one of my other websites, so no biggie there.
So, I figure it’s time for some drastic measures, not necessarily to spice up sales, but because I’m coming to some conclusions.
One, I’m going to remove all the products I’ve been advertising that concern Clickbank. I’ve had CB for about 4 years now, and I think it’s a dog. Yeah, I said it, and some of you agree, so it’s gone. I mean, according to their stats, I’ve never ever had a hit, which I know is wrong, so I’m just not in a trusting or considering mood. Now, this doesn’t mean if I specifically buy something that turns out to be from them, test it, and like it, that it won’t be shared, but the box that, as I write this, is on the right side,… it will be gone by the time you read this.
Something that might not have been noticed is that I removed two of my products from the left side, those being my book and CD set on leadership and management. Obviously, it seems no one comes to this blog for that sort of thing, so I’ve removed them from the top left and moved them to the bottom of the right side. Hey, I did create them after all, and I’m proud of them, so they stay, at least somewhere.
I’m probably removing SEO Book also, not because I don’t believe in it anymore, but it’s not really a book at this point, but a program, and my theory is that almost no one who visits this blog has the time to put into a long program. A real book, maybe, but not a full program. I have to think about what I want to put there, though. Truthfully, I wish Joel Comm was still selling his Adsense Secrets book as a standalone, because I’d put it there, but he’s giving it away and encouraging people to buy this recurring report thing, and I’m just not comfortable with that.
That’s about all I have. Not sure what other changes I might make to some of the products, as most everything I have is related to computers in some fashion, other than the image, which I love, and I think I’m going to continue promoting an image every month, mainly because I like seeing it; heck, I’m thinking about moving it up to make sure I see it all the time; what do y’all think of the picture?
The income is pretty nice. Keep up the good work. I been struggling to get my income back over $100 a month.
KushMoney´s last blog post..First Blog Contest For 2009
Thanks Kush; I’m sure you’ll get there.
Kushmoney I visited your blog many times and i noticed that your alexa ranking is higher (Mitch has the better ranking) than mitch’s so that can be the possible reason on why mitch is able to make a greater amount of money per month.
almir´s last blog post..Review Of “The One And Only” Atomic Blogging 3.0
LMAO!!! That is really funny. I hope you wasn’t serious when you said that. If you was, let me give you an update on things. Alexa ranking means nothing. I made kushmoney.com touch 60,000 rank with less than 2,000 visits a month last year. I am sure my income will get back to normal when I start flipping websites again.
KushMoney´s last blog post..Poker Training Weekly Launch Today!
no i wasn’t trying to be rude I like your blog and all don’t think i was trying to be offensive I mean that alexa does a better job at ranking a website once their well below the 150,000 mark. I’m basically trying to say when a website is at a consistent mark for so long a website is going to do a much better job in the long haul as the income is going to as well. I was being more general with my statement than anything else don’t get mad I was just making a point and although you find ALexa pointless many don’t they use it to determine a lot of different things such as income potential, advertising, and what not.
almir´s last blog post..Review Of “The One And Only” Atomic Blogging 3.0
I didn’t get mad, that’s why I laughed. Alexa is pointless and using it to determine things like income potential, advertising, and whatever else is just bad research.
KushMoney´s last blog post..Believe In Yourself
Actually, as I wrote in this post on Alexa just about six weeks ago, Alexa is more relevant now than it was about a year ago. Though some people are still touting the thing about it not being relevant, you won’t find a new post that’s condemning it since they changed their algorithms last April. At least I couldn’t when I was putting my article together.
Having said that, I will agree that, overall, it’s just another number, and it’s not a determinant of income potential, although some people might see it as a pretty good indicator of advertising potential, especially if you can get into the top 10,000. All those folks seem to be doing well as far as getting high paying advertisers.
I also agree with you as well Mitch that’s what I was saying to Kushmoney at first but he finally understood what I meant and didn’t take it the wrong way
almir´s last blog post..Review Of “The One And Only” Atomic Blogging 3.0
oh okay now I know your understanding where i’m coming from Kushmoney that’s great
almir´s last blog post..Review Of “The One And Only” Atomic Blogging 3.0
I see both of your points.
KushMoney´s last blog post..Believe In Yourself
Congratulations on your april earnings Mitch. Keep up the good work! and even thou you are bit disappointed on your adsense earning this month, just remember that many can’t even get $25 a month!
Thanks Salva. I’m going to continue trying to be better than ever.
I completely agree with Salwa, I was going to say that’s double of what Sire got last month so you did excellent. Instead of the 25 dollars a month on what Salwa stated I was going to say more around 10 dollars a month.
almir´s last blog post..Review Of “The One And Only” Atomic Blogging 3.0
Mitch…great, open, post. I find the comments re CB particularly interesting. It’s a story I’ve heard a lot. Have you tracked your outgoing links and kept that data? I’ve heard of others doing that and picking up with CB…
Tim´s last blog post..How to Create Blog Heaven – The 50 (Yes, 50!) Point Checklist – Part 1 of 5
No, I haven’t done that Tim. I’m not even sure how to do it, to tell you the truth. Still, they show no sales, and it’s probably the longest affiliate program I’ve belonged to, and not showing a single click or sale,… just not worth the time anymore. Course, I think the book I’m marketing there on the left, the $100 per day, might end up being a CB thing, but that’s not where I went to find it so it doesn’t count.
Mitch it seems April ain’t your month but April is my favorite month cause I was born on April:D
WordPress Theme´s last blog post..Tips To Use Before Buying Premium WordPress Theme
Happy Birthday, WT; I hope it was a great one. And April might have been my month; we’ll know better as time goes by.
Damn, that time of the month already. I reckon I will have to look at getting my stats post done some time soon.
Adsense; It has it ups and downs like everything else in life, as long as it is still making money for you its all good.
Advertisers; If they had any sense they would be looking for high traffic sites over high PR. My Load of BS site has a consistent contributor for months now and it’s been PR0 for ages.
ClickBank; Woof! I shot that dog ages ago.
It’s all good Mitch. The fact that you are always trying something new and getting rid of dead weight is the mark of a true businessman.
Sire´s last blog post..Using Comments To Double Your Exposure
Thanks Sire. I am always changing things up here, but I also know that, for the most part, this blog isn’t going to be my biggest money maker.
Never say never Mitch.
Well, maybe never is a long time, but at this juncture it’s highly unlikely it’ll be any time soon.
You’re right, Dennis, and I am grateful for at least that much money, which I wasn’t close to making last year at this time.
WoW, you’re able to earn nearly $150 for only one blog? It’s very inspiring, as I didn’t think we can generate any money from the blogging, Mitch!
No Will, that’s not from my blog, but from all my online stuff. No, the blog makes very little money; I know few “make money online” blogs that make any money, and I include this as one of those, although I write on more than just that.
But maybe one day, as Sire said,… 🙂
Hi Mitch,
Congrats on being in the top 5% of the people in the world who have actually made money online =)
Have you considered list building for a better income source though?
Asher
Asher Awesome´s last blog post..Revealing The 5 Undeniable Facts About Online Home Based Businesses
Thanks Asher. As for list building, I’ve never tried because I’m not quite sure what I’d do with it. That’s one I’ll have to think about some more.
what kinds of things did you do Mitch to get paid for paid advertising
almir´s last blog post..Review Of “The One And Only” Atomic Blogging 3.0
Almir, I really didn’t do anything. I have two kinds of paid advertising, one Google hates, one they don’t care for. Those companies are Text Link Ads and Link XL.
oh okay thanks for sharing is that why you have a zero page rank because you don’t really care for it
almir´s last blog post..Review Of “The One And Only” Atomic Blogging 3.0
Well, yes and no. Google doesn’t like paid advertising if you can’t make it nofollow, just as they don’t like paid reviews or bad language. Most people won’t pay for advertising on your blog if you don’t have page rank OR if you don’t allow them a dofollow status. So, you’re in a catch-22 in deciding which you want, money or page rank. If you have hundreds of thousands of unique visits a month, you’ll probably be able to obtain paid advertising, regardless of which way you go. Until then, though, you have to decide how you want to monetize your site.
I totally agree that Clickbank is a dog.
Maybe I missed this info in the previous posts but . . . do you know why you lost your page rank?
Someone probably turned me into Google for my paid advertising, which is at the bottom right of only the main page of my blog. It just happened with the last update, and it happened to a couple other bloggers I know at the same time.
Yeah, I know some one this happened to as well.
So, what can you do about it? Is there a process for pleading your case to Google?
Yes AHG, there is, but I won’t be doing it just yet. I can’t even think about appealing to Google until I drop the paid advertising, and right now, well, you see how much I got paid, and how big a piece of my pie it is. Now, if it starts to dwindle because of my page rank, I might kill it and then appeal. But for now, I don’t see a reason to do it, since they’re not going to consider it anyway.
Mitch,
Thanks for your reply. But I guess I’m still a little confused. Aren’t there LOTS of sites with PR that take paid ads? The washingtonpost.com, to take one example. How are they able to do that while you, and other bloggers, aren’t?
Airport Hotel Guru´s last blog post..The Best New York JFK Airport Hotels
First, AHG, I wanted to let you know that I shorten all usernames to their initials unless I know a first name for someone; kind of an unwritten policy, but I thought you should know.
Second, there are lots of sites that take paid ads, but they all set up those ads as nofollow. With TLA, they don’t offer that as an option, but they tend to pay fairly well if they can get advertisers to post on your blog. LinkXL goes a different way, adding their links via javascript, which Google doesn’t care about. And that’s where one gets dinged.
Ah, sorry. I didn’t know about your policy. Actually, Firefox automatically filled the name in for me. I’ll just use my real name.
I didn’t know that most ads have a nofollow attached to them either. I have CJ ads on my site and those do NOT have a nofollow attached. Should I take those down? At the moment it is more important for me to keep my page rank if I can.
Ramsey´s last blog post..The Best New York JFK Airport Hotels
From what I understand, Google sees those somewhat differently, but truthfully, we should probably be adding the nofollow link to it. I haven’t done it myself, but I know that’s not penalizing me because I’ve had those types of ads on other websites for many years without problems. No, it’s something about being paid directly by an advertiser for what they consider the purpose being to increase their own page rank, which can’t be working if everyone who accepts their advertising loses it.
Which sucks considering they are quite happy if you get paid by advertisers as long as you use them as the go between.
Absolutely correct, Sire; inherently not fair.
Exactly,which is why I don’t worry about PR. If someone will pay me to advertise on my site and I approve of their site then I’m going to take it and the big G can go take a hike.
Sire´s last blog post..The Security Of Your Photos Is Important
Well, it’s getting those advertisers now, isn’t it? You and I are in a similar position. I went to check out Nihar’s income for the month, for which a link was provided from your blog, and I saw how many visitors he’s getting. If we were getting that many on our blogs, I bet we’d be monetized to the hilt!
Yeah that’s pretty good isn’t it. As for advertisers I’ve had one advertising on my Load of BS site for months now. I suppose that means he likes the traffic he’s getting from it because that site has a PR0
Really? Is that the guy in your tips area, or is he advertising elsewhere?
Nope, not in the tips area at all. It’s in the left sidebar, the link being backgammon online.
Sire´s last blog post..A Twitter Service You’d Be Crazy To Miss Out On
Wow Sire, I never even noticed that little link before.
Now that is surprising lol.
Sire´s last blog post..A Twitter Service You’d Be Crazy To Miss Out On
It is not a bad show man. AdSense income for most people have been coming down. I had a pathetic month with AdSense though I don’t want to mention the numbers. It was mainly due to repositioning and displaying it only for search users.
Fortunately, my private ad sales have almost 100% fill rate
Good luck for May
Ajith Edassery´s last blog post..Blog Scraping – How to deal with it?
Thanks Ajith; I appreciate it. At least you’re selling some private ads; need to think about that one some more.
Mitch, Nice Earnings. Visited your blog for the first time. Will be in touch…
How about the traffic details?
Nihar´s last blog post..April 2009 Blog Traffic & Income statistics
Thanks Nihar. I usually write a separate post about traffic details, but not as regular. I’m sure one is upcoming. lol
Congrats on the earnings, it seems like a lot of people had poor earnings this month. I lost $100s this month, I guess I’ll just have to work harder and hope it was a glitch 🙂
I hope I can get my Adsense back up, although it’s really out of my hands, to tell you the truth. We can only optimize so much, and it doesn’t make any sense to use Adwords to try to draw people to any of these sites.
Hi Mitch,
Congratulations on such good numbers. Your adsense earnings are looking very impressive to me. Things are really looking very bright for you. Well done and keep up the good work.
Peter Lee
Work At Home Blog´s last blog post..Off-Site Over-Optimization Is Now Possible!
Thanks Peter. I think I’m going to have to take some time to add more articles to the site, though; it’s starting to suffer from boredom, it seems.
I received my first check from Google a couple of months ago. It was for $101.00. I was so excited but still can’t quite figure out how I got it or how long it took to accumulate it.
I enjoy reading your posts on making money online. Maybe you can help me make more.
If I can help you make more money, Miss Bev, it’ll mean that I’m also making pretty good money, and I don’t mind sharing information.