Google AdSense tracking in Google Analytics
Google has finally launched something that will help a lot to track the performance of your AdSense campaings. If you already own some websites that uses AdSense to monetize, you will love this new feature because it will allow you to see detailed AdSense revenue by website, which was absolutely not possible with the AdSense-only interface.
What is it ?
It is the ability to link your AdSense account with your Analytics account. By doing this, every impression and every click will be tracked in Analytics.
Where do I go to see the detailed stats ?
When you link your two accounts, you will see a new menu item appear in your Analytics account, just like this one :
You will see 3 different menu items under "AdSense" (in fact 4, but the first is only the summary of the 3 others). These are the 3 different statistics you can get for AdSense.
What will I see in "Top AdSense content" ?
You will get detailed stats (total revenue, clicks, impressions, CTR and eCPM) for every page on your website. This is simply AWESOME. With this feature I discovered that in my dating website, the page that is generating the more revenue is the registration page.
Here's what it looks like :
Like any other Analytics graph you can change the view to "table", "pie chart", "performance chart" and the "comparison chart". You can also sort the table columns and change the time period.
What will I see in "Top AdSense referers" ?
You will see detailed stats (total revenue, clicks, impressions, CTR and eCPM) for each referer. A referer is a domain name on which your ad has been shown and clicked. For example, if 2 people clicks on your ad shown on www.example.com and clicks 2 ads each (40c each), the revenue for the referer www.example.com will be 1,60$.
Let's take a look at this :
With this feature you can easily track where your ads are being shown and which website leads you the most valuable members. As you can see in my stats, my most valuable referer is hotmail.
What will I see in "AdSense trends" ?
You will see what you already see in your AdSense account : revenue by day, just like this :
The only difference is that you will get a little bit more because you can choose exaclty what trend you want to see, by using this menu :
How do I activate it ?
Now that I convinced you to use this awesome feature, let's activate it. First, I assume you already have your AdSense account and your Analytics account and everything is up and running on your different websites.
1. Go to "Analytics settings" on your Analytics account and click on "Edit AdSense linking settings".
2. Check every AdSense website you want to track in your Analytics account.
3. Select the primary website. I suggest you take your biggest revenue generating website (the one that has the more traffic) or the website that is the least editable, because for each other website you will have to open the source code to add something.
4. Open the source code of your other websites and put the little JavaScript code block at the beginning of all pages (it may be a good idea to have a master page on your website where you can globally put the code, instead of opening every page).
It is very important that the tracking code (just like the one below) be placed in the "<head>" tag. If you don't do so, the tracking will simply NOT work. Trust me, I already tried !
<script type="text/javascript"> window.google_analytics_uacct = "UA-123456-1";</script>
Conclusion
Google is and will stay for a while the best advertising company on the net. Just try to find another service that provides you the same tracking functionality.
What is an AdSense-only website and why does it exists ?
There is many people who wants to make money easily. There is many ways to on the net to make money. One of them is by using the Google AdSense program. Because it is easy to use and provide easy money, many people are starting using it every day.
The Google phenomenom has caused a new phenomenom: the AdSense-only websites. There is TOO MANY websites that exists only to display ads and make money. This king of website is becoming more and more popular because it is cheap and content-cheap, so they are easy to create and maintain.
This exists because some people creates websites on which they try to sell books to know everything about the "AdSense secrets" for about 10$ (I already saw 200$ one day). They always tell that they personnaly make thousands of dollars every month with the AdSense program but in fact, the real money they do is with their one-page website on which they sell their books for a lot more than what it's worth. Those books DOES NOT contains anything you can't find for free (and easily) on Google.
Here is a list of websites you should NEVER trust (I don't add link because I don't want Google to think I actually link to them) :
http://www.adsenseonly.com/
http://adsense-secrets.com/
http://www.instant-adsense-templates.com/
http://www.googleadsensesecrets.com/
http://www.10adsensesecrets.info/
http://www.thesecretsofadsense.com/
http://www.adsensetrafficsecrets.com/
http://www.adsense.deeljeabiz.com/
On the other hand, these sites gives you real AdSense tips (for real websites) :
http://www.seopedia.org/contextual-advertising/google-adsense-adwords/5-google-adsense-secrets-tips-and-tricks/
http://www.wolf-howl.com/22/google-adsense-tips-tricks-and-secrets/
Always remember this simple rule : if it's too good to be true, it is because it IS too good to be true !
Do I have to buy things on "AdSense secrets" sites to make money ?
You probably saw a lot of times websites with titles like "Google AdSense secrets revealed" or "Making millions with Google AdSense". Those sites encourage you to buy their books, their video advices and other stuff. All they want to do is make money with you, while you think you're learning something to make more money than them.
First of all, stop thinking AdSense is the way to make millions for everyone. Yes, some people makes millions with this program, like Markus Frind (PlentyOfFish), but don't think because you read books and books you will make millions too ! By doing this you will only help people getting richer and richer selling you something you can get for free.
All you need to know to make some money with Google AdSense is everywhere on the net, and free ! There is only some simple rules to follow to succesfully make some money with this. There's not an absolute formula that works every time. Everything is different from sites to sites, you have to try it yourself.
By experience, if you want to make money with Google AdSense you have to try many different formulas. You have to change the size of your ads, the places where you put them, the colors, etc... Each website is different, so every website needs a different advertising strategie. You can find some good ideas if you Google the web for "AdSense tips", but the best school you can have is to visit websites that uses the Google AdSense program and try to see how they places their ads.
The most important thing you need to remember from this article is that you never have to pay to get good AdSense tips. You can find everything you need for free.
How I started my own dating site
How I started this site :
http://www.iseduction.net
I was wondering what I could do to generate more money than just my salary. I was thinking and thinking every day and every night 'till the day I decided to create a dating site. It was not my first website. I already did some for companies and for games, like
http://www.aidemyst.info/ (Myst & Riven help site).
(2006-05) Because I wanted to do it all by myself I started to put my ideas on a sheet of paper, putting more and more every day. I knew I was going to use the .Net framework 2.0 and SQL Server 2000, so I read a lot on the net to search for optimization techniques and things to care before publishing the website on the web. I then started to design my database, putting tables, stored procedures and so on. I then took Photoshop to design my web pages. I also purchased some icons and pictures on sites like
istockphoto to fasten to design process, and because I'm not the best web designer, normaly I design entreprise applications (my day work).
(2006-07) I started to add some asp.net code behing all that. It took me about 8 months to get something to work great. It took me a lot of time to make PayPal payments works.
(2007-07-07) I'm not someone who is very superstitious but because my site was ready for publishing in July 2007, I waited for the 2007-07-07 to arrive so I can put my site on the net at this time. For more sevens, I waited for the clock to show 07:07:07am :-). Everything whent great, I started to display my AdWords ads and traffic started to come in. My first strategy was to expose my website worldwide to see where people would came from the most. It appears to me that Africa gaves me A LOT more members than America of Europe so I decided to advertise only in Africa : first mistake ! In africa I can get clicks for 2 cents (that is absolutely perfect for someone who don't want to invest a lot in this). To be able to send message in the site, (int the first version) the user must pay. In africa they barely get 1000$ per year, so charging 20$ a month is a lot too much for them.
(2007-08) I then decided to advertise in America (USA and Canada) but It was about 20-50 cents a clikc !! That was killing my daily budget, so I was thinking what to do : turn into a free dating site ? invest more ? try to advertise on different network (other than Google) ? It's difficult to choose ! I was jungling with ideas, but for the moment, I returned to africa because I wanted to get some traffic, even if they don't pay, I wanted traffic because this is the heart of any working web site : traffic.
(2007-11) In my search of the perfect campain, I opened a Microsoft AdCenter account : second mistake. I lost my 5$ charged to open the account and never got a ad impression on the network... don't even think about a click ! So I closed it. I then decided to stay in Africa and turn into a 100% free to use web site : first good idea.
(2007-12) In the process of becoming free, I also decided to switch from SQL Server to MySQL : another very good idea. For personnal websites, I suggest you use MySQL because it is free and easy to use and performs very well. I also changed to design of the website. Everything has been changed. Everything ! I put some AdSense ads everywhere on the pages. I removed the paypal payment form, I removed some unnecessary functionnalities like changing the visual theme of the site. I remembered something one of my teachers told me : (KISS) Keep It Simple and Stupid. I helped a lot, because with less unused functionnalities, it is simplier to maintain the source code.
(2008-01) I uploaded the new version of the site. I started to see a real difference. I started to get revenues from the ads. I also put some affiliate network ads. It works great too. The only problem was that every clicks I got what giving me cents (1-5)... This is not like this I was going to be rich ! So I canged my advertisement strategy to Canada. I started to advertise in Quebec (where I live), paying about 8-10 cents per click. The revenues I got started to grow. Because competition is better in Canada than Africa, every click was giving me 10-90 cents : a lot better ! Don't pay less to get less, pay more to get more !
(2008-03) Now I get approximately the same amount of money I invest every day. The main source of revenue is AdSense but affiliate marketing pays a lot too.
http://www.iseduction.net