It depends, common sense says anywhere from 1 to 3. But its depending what sort of business you are advertising on and what sort of conversion you r getting. For one of my clients (they sell commodities) we were always below or main competitor with cheaper price than them and it worked for a while. yes, all depends of your conversions, you might find you convert better on the 3th position than on the 1st and this mean a s*** lot of savings.
Oh ok, so even if you're using the content network with Search turned off, CTR still matters. Or am I wrong? I know there's no QS when using the content network.
I would say being in top 5 is ok, but if the niche is really competitive, then any position on the first page is alright.
@ Greg - The most sought after positions is 1 - 3, this is normally considered the "best" positions, however ROI does not always correlate. Content has a QS, just CTR is excluded from the equation. If you attempting content marketing, but sure it is contained in its own campaign away from google search and network settings. Content positioning can also be confusing since you will be appearing in position 1 for many site and position 10 for more competitive sites averaging you out to 5.4 or something similar. I would recommend excluding the sites you are positioning 10 and try to maintain position 1 - 3 for sites that are in your price range.
There is a difference between a campaign ad position and a keyword ad position....Some keywords are very expensive because they have more competition others are not. Most often the ones with higher competition are making more money for the advertisers. So check your keywords and see their positions, sometimes it shows you have a good position, but still does not appear on the first 11. But 5.4 is good.