With the economic problems, has anybody seen a decrease in their income from adwords? I certainly have, but I wondered if it was just my bad luck
While I don't get too much revenue from adsense, I have seen the clicks go down. But I would imagine that sites that cater to an economic crisis would do better like credit card repair, foreclosures, mutual funds, debt relief, etc...
In most cases businesses will be earning less from Adwords only because people have reigned in the spending. Price-elastic products (wants rather than needs) will suffer the most. I do have some cases who have seen an increase in business during these rough economic times. One of my clients is a career coaching company and with the unemployment rate on the rise more and more people are finding out about the company's services.
I think it depends on the market, not all of the market will suffer from the economic problems. If you advertise on AdWords for the right market in the right time you can make a lot of money even if there are some problems in the economy...
Two thing that may or may not be related to the current economy. 1. The number of advertisers in my field has dropped significantly in the last few months - the number of sponsored results is down about 35% (down from 600+ to 400+). I assume this is due to the economy and not simply people giving up on Google (following all the QS and 1st page bid upheaval) and going elsewhere. So, potentially good news in less competition but no great benefit in that they were mostly the smaller players - the usual suspects are all still there at the top of the rankings. 2. The 1st Page Bid Estimates have increased considerably in the last few weeks. I am not sure whether this is a result of actual bidder activity (those same usual suspects fighting for the top slots in hard times) or G trying to 'game' the system (in the hope the brainless just keep upping their bids in response.) I have seen a marginal drop in my average positions so suspect it is a bit of both.