So, quite a few of us here who have seen a more or less significant decline in eCPM--be it due to decline in CTR or CPC or both--compared to the past years. Of course, some might have seen the opposite, but fact is most are down compared to... whatever date they choose to compare. Well, if you ask me, it shouldn't be all that suprising that the money we can squeeze out of a visitor is declining. When 1.5 years ago, at the end of the month, I recorded an almost double-digit eCPM, I knew it wouldn't last forever. I simply didn't think the traffic was worth this much. Since then, every month was worse than the previous one. OK, I can agree that, due to increased competition in my niche, my eCPM can go down, say, 30%. OK, I understand that people are no longer so click-happy--that's 20% less money from 1000 page impressions. I can understand that the economy tanked a lil' bit. BUT, this month's eCPM is one-fourth, or even one-fifth, of what it was 1.5 years ago! To cap it all, my currency got annoyingly strong over the aforementioned period, so that's a double-whammy. The only bright spot is actually HOW MUCH traffic I get: it has increased ca. five-fold (note that the source of traffic is almost identical--no cheap traffic etc). So, here I am scratching on my head: Has the structure of my traffic changed SO much over this period? Or maybe it is some kind of penalty? Maybe it's just a combination of a number of factors: lower CTR, poorer traffic (not so willing to buy), a penalty, more competition? Maybe Google itself has *something* to do with this? Whatever it is, it's just insane. My niche is education-related, so I don't think it is a very "cheap" niche--like gaming and such. Getting traffic is rather difficult and time-consuming, so I can't imagine anyone starting a website in this niche with the prospect of 10 bucks earned for 5000 page impressions. So, is anyone here experiencing anything similar to what I have described? If so, how are you dealing with it? I do not make a living off my website, but it's really annoying because I have put quite a lot of effort into developing it.
There has been no decrease, of any statistical significance, in my eCPM, and it's actually gone up in the last year (though probably not at a significant level). The only thing I've really noticed is that the variance has decreased a bit which just means that, day to day, the eCPM is more of a consistent number.