On some of my pages I have a leaderboard (image or text) at the top and 3 referral buttons at the bottom, Firefox, Google Pack and Picasa. Firefox and Picasa pay $1 each per conversion. I presume the Google Pack pays the same but I haven't had one converted yet so I'm not 100% sure on that. Today, I've notice the leaderboard at the top displaying image ads for Picasa and the Google pack. My question is this: 1: If someone clicks on this leaderboard ad, does it pay for a click? 2: If someone installs it, does it pay $1 the same as the referral button? Seems daft to have to put Google in the competitive ad filter....
Really, I never realised that. I'm not so worried about the click as referrals don't pay for the click anyway, they only pay on a conversion. What I'm really asking is does this leaderboard ad compete with my referrals? It seems a bit of a liberty if Google are circumnavigating my referrals to pay less. Those $1 conversions are a nice touch. [edit] Damn, they're showing up in the text ads on the leaderboard as well now.
A leaderboard ad showing referrals instead? That is unusual, but I have seen another thread about it. If this is done officially by Google, then it's okay and you will get credit for any clicks on it. However, I've heard that rogues are buying adwords which look like referals, which means they will get the credit (wish I thought of that). If you spot any leaderboards that look like this, then check the URL and add it to your competitive filter. Cryo.
Yes, I've checked the URL (by hovering the mouse over the ad) and it does go to Google. However, I don't have the faith you have in Google paying the whole $1 if the person signs up via their ad rather than my referral button....
I was wondering what those Google software ads paid. $1 doesn't seem like a lot. Do you get good conversion on those?
Not a lot. I've only been on Adsense for a couple of months so I haven't got a lot to compare them with yet. In those two months (November and December) I've had 23 referral clicks and 3 paying conversions. I'm betting that Google's own ads (the ones that show up in my leaderboard) don't pay the full $1 though and I'm thinking of putting Google in the Competitive Ad Filter. It's really annoying me. I reached my first $100 on December 30th, just in time for the December pay out (isn't this the stage I get banned?), and so far, my average is working out at $0.32 per click. I'm happy with that percentage at the moment. My next goal is to double that to $100 a month, then $100 a week.... Incidentally, the 'ban' comment was a joke. I don't cheat.
You're going really nice! However, I wonder what Google would think if you blocked their ads. It may not be in the TOS, but they definately won't like you for it.
Yes, I agree and I do feel a bit worried about it. I've already decided that I'm going to ask Google directly (it'll be my first post to them) before actually doing it. It looks like no-one really has the answer here.
If it appears on your ad unit, most probably it will pay for clicks. As I know, no matter what ad appear on your ad unit, it will only pays as a normal ads. If it's like what you thought, then when people sign up for Google by clicking on its ads will convert you $100, but it's most probably impossible.
That makes perfect sense Vincent and I'm sure you're right. I'm also begining to wonder if I was worrying too much over nothing. My first reaction was that if somebody signed up via the Google ad, rather than the referral button, then I'd be earning less. When I consider this a bit more, it could well turn out that people who may NOT hit the referral button might be more attracted to this huge leaderboad image. $0.10 is better than $0.00..... Swings and roundabouts really.