Associated Content and Adsense
Having seen the suggestion on an online forum that rather than publishing your writing on Associated Content you would be better off putting it onto your own website or blog, and putting Google ads on the pages using Google AdSense I decided to test this experimentally. I have had some scientific
training as well as having worked in research at Adelaide University
for over 17 years, so I can see for myself the weaknesses of the
comparison. However, I think there is a limited validity to it, and
certainly for my own purposes it allows some comparison of the two.
Method
My web site is www.bettatrading.com.au. On this web site, as well as price lists and things like contact
information; I have included many of the articles I have also published on Associated Content. Most of these articles on my wedsite have Google AdSense ads on them. Every time someone clicks on them I receive a share of Google's charge for the ad.
Results
For
the two months of March and April 2009 I have recorded the results from
the two. On Associated Content I received in the two months 5832 page
impressions. Associated Content pays for these at the rate of $1.50 per
thousand, giving me a total payment of $8.45.
On my web site I
received 2128 page views on the pages with Adsense ads on them. I got
37 clicks, giving total earnings of $4.80. This was an average of 13
cents per click. ($2.26 per thousand page views.)
Conclusions
The
results do not justify the proposition that you will earn more with
Adsense. The amounts earned are small, but large enough for comparison.
Because I am not a legal resident of the United States, Associated
Content cannot pay me upfront payments for my articles, so I still own
the copyright to them. This means that I can increase my earnings by
putting my writing onto both sites. It also means that I could put them
onto other sites as well. So far I have not done this, but I may in the
future.
Steve Challis
