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In the comments to my 10 Step Plan to a Profitable Blog post Trisha asks

How necessary is it to really find and write around high paying adsense terms? Does it make that much difference as long as you are writing about something that has some commercial relevance?

I did reply but I think it is worth a fuller explanation here.

Perhaps the easiest way to think about Adsense on your blog is to imagine your blog posts as being searches on Google. The words you use to compose your post are like search phrases and Google will attempt to return the most relevant results for the phrases you use. Think about your niche and the phrases people might use for research, leisure, etc. Then consider what words and phrases are used for commercial searches. The difference between the adsense payout for those different categories will be like night and day.

To give you an example one of my niches is programming so syntax or error message research phrases might be entered into Google search such as “sorting a list alphabetically” or “changing scrollbar colour”, etc. OK, a savvy advertiser might cotton on to the fact that those phrases are perfect for targeting a particular products audience but the competition for those phrases will be sow low we are talking pennies a click. On the other hand if the phrases used were highly commercial and competitive the payout is transformed. In programming these would be (I am guessing) “.net/java/php training” or broader IT terms like “data recovery”.

How do you know your guesses are right? Well first of all you can see the affects in your adsense account but a litmus test is to do some searches in Google and see how many ads show up. You can usually see just by looking at your adsense ads that show up in your posts how commercial and targeted your topic is. To illustrate with the example I used in my comment on the thread, take a look at this and this and work out which draws more income from adsense. I expect you will not find it difficult. If like me a percentage of your posts have ads for “free blogs” your content is not targeted enough to earn more than the bare minimum.

So if you are inflicted with a low paying topic how can you fix it? Personally I wouldn’t push this too hard, I actually think bending your blog to fit adsense is a bad move long term and this sort of thing is what makes adsense so damaging. On the other hand you might only need one or two teaks so that is fair enough.

1. Be concious of your page titles – vague and non-commercial page titles give vague and non-commercial ads. The title (and filename interestingly enough, which on most blogs now are synonymous) has a disproportionate influence on which ads show up. Try and insert a company/product/service into titles that risk not performing.
2. Always come back to money posts – Steer the content back to more commercial topics after addressing less commercial subjects. I wouldn’t encourage you to make a previously non-commercial blog 100% commercial as that is dangerously veering towards the splog. A good mix is probably best.
3. Post commercial posts last – In a blogging day you want to leave the commercial topic top of page for longest. Overnight you don’t want the top post to be “and by the way my cat did the cutest thing” when you have a “Brand X announces update to product Y” post right under it. The top post can often influence the ads for the whole index page.
4. Use section targeting – Section targeting is an adsense feature that allows you to influence adsense to take more notice of certain content than others using comment tags. It doesn’t work brilliantly for me but I have heard it can help.

So what about these lists of high paying adsense terms? Yes there are lists out there that promise to tell you which phrases earn $15 a click (or more) and they are useful … to a point. First you have to remember that these headline figures are NOT what you would get paid, not even close. They are what you would bid in adwords for search, a very different prospect. People bid much lower in content than they do in search, you get a cut not the whole fee and smart pricing reduces it even further. I have always had the nagging feeling that if you can get hold of this exact phrase info then Google is probably using it too, perhaps to seek out spammers. Paranoid? Probably, doesn’t mean they don’t do it. Best way to use those lists is to get ideas for broad subject areas that might be more profitable than what you are currently covering rather than using the exact phrases.

Which brings me to the final point, exact phrase matches are less important than getting the page theme right. Incremental improvements will make a big difference to your adsense income without destroying any audience you once had by twisting your blog into a made for adsense site. You don’t need to laser target your content, just be in the right ballpark. After all, your blog is all about your readers enjoying your content, not random visitors clicking adsense ads and never coming back.

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Another social bookmarking site for you to take note of, what makes this an important contender is the company behind it is AOL and the site in question is the made-over and pimped-up Netscape

Jason Calacanis had this to say

Of course, in the first hour of being open we get tested by a bunch of DIGG users who voted up a story about a horrible AOL user experience–to the second position!

We’ve started doing metajournalism on the first wave of stories already… this is a real test of our integrity.

It is indeed going to be interesting to see how this plays out. Digg is going to have to respond to this. Of course the most loyal Digg users are going to knock it and they will be laughing their socks off that a negative story got to number one. Regardless of what the Digg fans think AOL is big enough that they don’t need their approval nor particularly want it. AOL plays to the mass market and have the budget to make some big waves.

Already they are drawing criticism for alleged “sneaky linking” (ie. not giving full and obvious link credit). I think this sort of thing will be soon remedied.

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Compared with the ineffective crapshoot that is traditional advertising, there’s no better way to get targeted traffic than through pay-for-performance keyword advertising in search engines. If you’re not clear on what pay per click ads are, those are the sponsored links that show up when you perform a web search in Google, Yahoo and other search engines.

While more targeted than offline advertising or banner ads, it’s certainly possible to throw away a lot of cash with pay per click. The way to do that is to fail to think strategically about where you send people who click on your ads.

The goal of pay per click advertising is to get in front of searchers who are looking specifically for what you have to offer. This takes careful keyword research, strategic bidding, and compelling ad copy just to get the click.

The problem is, that’s where most people stop.

They make the mistake of sending that targeted traffic to the home page of their website or blog. Even worse, they make no attempt to establish a relationship with those that don’t buy, so as to boost conversion rates for every dollar spent.

So, if you’re selling products or services, it makes sense to make sales and build your fan club at the same time. Here’s how to boost your conversion rates from any pay per click campaign while also boosting your subscriber numbers.

1. The first thing to do is build a ultra-specific page to send the search traffic to, called a landing page. Depending on the variety of key words you are bidding on, you may even build several landing pages that each narrowly address the specific needs of that searcher.
2. When I say “searchers,” I mean searchers. Do not participate in contextual advertising programs on publisher sites. I think we’ve all seen enough AdSense spam to understand part of the reasoning here. But even on reputable sites, contextual advertising brings too many “curiosity clicks” that kill your return on investment. You want people who are actively looking for what you are offering. You can choose to opt-out of non-search traffic with both Google and Yahoo.
3. The landing page does not sell your product or service. This is key. You instead offer a quality free resource –- a mini-course, ebook, teleseminar, or other type of tutorial that is directly related to what you are ultimately selling. By teaching people about the subject matter of your product or service, you are actually engaging in a highly effective form of selling, all while establishing a relationship.
4. Whatever your free offer, it must be delivered by an email or RSS autoresponder that allows you to stay in contact with the prospect.
5. You should explicitly inform your prospects that in addition to the free resource you are offering, they will also be receiving your email newsletter / blog updates. Make sure you make this part of your offer as enticing as possible. You’re delivering valuable, relevant content on a regular basis, right?

And there you have it. You’ll likely make some sales right away, but your real profits will come from the people who warm up to your offer thanks to the ongoing value you provide with your blog content.

This technique is by no means new. But it’s shocking how many people still don’t use it, as they waste good money sending targeted traffic to a home page that is not laser-focused, and also fail to offer true value to the searcher that results in a relationship.

You don’t propose marriage before you get a first date. And you likewise shouldn’t expect people to just automatically jump at the chance to give you money upon arriving at your home page.

Of course, each of the five steps above could use some elaboration, and I’ll be offering tips in the future that can help boost landing page conversions even for those who have been using this method for years. Also, the key word research and bidding process in Google AdWords (the largest pay per click program) is a topic in itself that requires mastery to be effective.

I promised myself I would not post this week, as im on holiday with my daughter for a few days, but I can’t resist congratulating Om Malik as he turns Pro Blogger and ditches his Business2.0 gig.

I think the move had been coming for a while, but I know it must have been a tough decision as when we last spoke a few weeks back it was still undecided — The plunge has been taken though, and with some VC backing (like Aaron, im a little confused by that) there will most likely be some interesting things coming out of GigaOm in coming months.

Congratulations Om!

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