Google Adsense Question & Answer
I just finished responding to a post on the Warrior Forum about Adsense, so I thought I would post it here as well, in case one of my readers gets some benefit from it.
The question asked was:
Is there a downside to having just one domain for a bunch of different niche sites for adsense revenue?I am building adsense niche sites, each with several content pages, and then submitting articles to directories for traffic. Sort of like Captain Tim Gorman does.
But I think he has a unique domain for each site he builds. Why not just have one domain for everything, with subdomains for each site?
Since traffic is going to be coming probably exclusively from article directories, it seems like one domain is all you’d need.
So for example, I’d have one domain: www.superdomain.com
And then for each niche I’d just add a subdomain like so:
www.superdomain.com/dogtraining
www.superdomain.com/coffeebeans
www.superdomain.com/sodacans
www.superdomain.com/drugsIs there anything wrong with this?
Here’s my answer, especially after reading about 10-15 other replies, many of whom were complaining about how tough Google makes it for Adsense publishers, cancelling their accounts and so forth.
You can read the full post on the forum here: Google Adsense Question
So, here’s my response:
Interesting question… My opinion is that if you are only going to build sites with “several content pages” on a variety of different topics, that you would be better off going with individual domain names for each site.
That way, you can have the primary keyword of the site in the url itself. From an SEO point of view, that is definitely a benefit.
HOWEVER, I would encourage you to NOT build sites with just a few pages… That is a very short term thinking process when it comes to Adsense. In google’s eyes (more about them in a minute) its just a cheap’n'nasty site built just to earn income from Adsense (typically called MFA - Made For Adsense sites) and they don’t tend to like them.
You would achieve FARRRRR better results by building 1-2 bigger sites with as much unique content on them as possible, so that you target a broad range of keywords and ultimately draw in higher amounts of SE traffic.
I have 2 clients that have done this very thing, and when I added Adsense to their websites, their earnings went nuts in a very short period of time. One rose to over US$1000/month in her first month, and the other took several months longer, but has peaked at nearly $2000/month, with stable earnings over $1400/month.
I can guarantee you that if you build 20 sites with a few articles on each, you will NEVER earn that sort of money from them UNLESS you find some way to get HEAPS of dirt cheap or free traffic to them, and that will be tough unless you are willing to pay for it (PPC).
Now, to discuss the google issue…
I constantly see people complaining about their actions or living in fear of Google and their “supposed” arbitrary attitude to adsense site owners…
Folks, lets get one thing straight!
Google’s #1 PRIORITY (with adsense) is to protect the integrity of their advertising system & ensure that their advertisers (those people using the adwords system to put their ads out into the market place) do NOT get ripped off or scammed.
In Google’s eyes, a MFA site is nothing more than an annoyance to themselves AND their advertisers, especially if its a crappy quality site that truly offers NO value to visitors, except for the ad links there to be clicked on.
If google’s advertisers find that their ROI from using the content network to advertise (that’s what google calls the adsense network) is decreasing, or nose diving, then they will stop advertising using Adsense, which means google stops earning $$$ AND the adwords program gets a bad name with advertisers.
Think about it for 10 seconds, and forget about what YOU want (traffic, clicks & money) and you’ll immediately see that google MUST act to protect the integrity of their advertising system (after all, it’s their cash cow) AND they must protect their advertisers from people whose motives are less than pure, or their entire business model will stumble and fall rapidly, and they will fade into insignificance…
So, google is not being arbitrary about their rules to do with adsense sites, and nor are they out to “get you” … UNLESS you build crappy sites that offer no value to visitors and put their ads on them.
My two previously mentioned clients have large sites (well in excess of 100 unique pages), get lots of traffic (because they have lots of quality unique content) AND offer genuine value to the visitor WITHOUT adsense. They are google’s ideal sort of “client” when it comes to adsense, and hence they reward them for giving them (google) what they want, AND for offering an excellent site for their clients to advertise on.
Stop trying to nickel & dime your way to adsense riches. You won’t be the first to try, and certainly not the last, but all you will ultimately get for your troubles is grief & aggravation, and not much money at all…
Success with adsense comes from working WITHIN google’s rules & requirements, rather than trying to fight them. You could easily spend as much time building 1-2 larger, more helpful & high-value (to the visitor) sites as you could building 20 crappy sites, so why waste your time on the nickel & dime path, when it’s destined to never give you the results you want.
BTW: I know that tim gorman promotes this kind of method, but there’s lots going on in the background with Tim’s sites that you might not know about, and he’s not likely to divulge ALL of his secrets. PLUS, Tim builds his sites to be of genuine value to visitors, not just to fill electronic space so he can add adsense to them.
Jim Edwards Dumb Mistakes
I just finished reading Jim Edwards new Article “Make Big Bucks With Real Surveys“, and in it, he tells the story of how he used to make lots of dumb mistakes!
“In a former life I believed in doing things the hard way and learning (or maybe not learning) from mistakes.”
In this article, Jim discusses surveys, and how powerful they are when it comes to giving your customers what they REALLY want, rather than letting your ego dictate what you “think” they want (but often find out you are wrong!).
I first met Jim last year, in December, when my business partner Clayton & I flew to the USA to attend the “Jim Boat” cruise he put on, with his good friend & business associate Mike Stewart.
Jim’s a fascinating guy in many respects (plus his mother & father are just lovely folks), but I think one thing I got really strongly from Jim was that he’s a no-nonsense “tell it like it is” kind of guy.
Down under, we’d say he’s a “no bullshit bloke”, but that would be rude, so I won’t say it! 
Anyway, the point I’m trying to make is simply that Jim’s advice is pretty damn solid. He’s got PLENTY of runs on the board, so far as creating financial success goes, so I’m inclined to follow his advice when it comes to Surveys.
One thing I have learned in my last 2 years of working at Australia’s top SEO firm is that too many people venturing into online businesses make the mistake of NOT surveying their customer base (or their future potential customer base) for what it is that they want.
They just get it in their mind that the market wants “x”, and then they invest lots of time & money into producing “x” and building a website to promote it, and so on & so forth, and then when it comes to them actually selling any of their product/s, they bomb BIG time!
I have seen clients spend 10s of THOUSANDS of dollars on this fools game, only to end up at the other end of the journey broke & devastated that it didn’t work. In all cases, they blamed the website or Google or something else, but in all cases I know for sure that it was because THEY failed to provide what the market really wanted.
I always encourage new clients to run a small Google AdWords campaign, just to test the market place & see what happens. After all, why not spend a few hundred dollars in testing BEFORE you waste $10,000 & 6-12 months of time, just to find out if you are wasting your time or not.
On the other hand, a small adwords test can sometimes show up where the holes in their idea are, and you can then move to fill the gaps and create a success after all.
It all depends on your mindset & willingness to be wrong AND whether your ego is getting in the road!
So, after you’ve read Jim’s article, why not set up your own customer survey. Find out where they’re at and what they do & don’t want, and then take things from there. You can use a survey tool such as this to achieve this, and drive some traffic with adwords.
If you want some help with setting up a basic adwords survey and using the survey tool I recommended, check my Adwords Management offering out and send me an email to discuss the details. I can put together something for as little as $220 + your adwords costs.
Intern Program Answer Time
Well folks, 2 things to mention today:
1) Happy Birthday to my twin sister & myself! 
42 today.
2) James Brausch answered my question about Interns as follows:
How do you actually get the RIGHT people to put their hands up to become an intern?
I don’t. I have no pre-qualification for level 1 interns. The more the merrier.
Fair call. And, his answer makes more sense if you go and actually read the rest of the post with his answers to the other questions about Intern programs. You can find the post here:
Intern Program Answer Time with James Brausch
And, he’s released a CD called “Intern Orientation“, which you can check out on his blog.
Lastly, congratulations to Jon Symons of the Art of Money blog, who won James $10,000 prize for his question about Intern Programs. I had a quick browse over his blog (it IS 10 mins to 1 am, so I think a quick browse is pretty good for this time of night! ) and he has some good stuff on it. I will check it out some more when I get a bit more time.
James Brausch Intern Program Question
One of the few blogs I read regularly is that of James Brausch (of jamesbrausch.com). He’s totally blunt, with no tolerance for fools, but the man has got some gold nuggets of wisdom to share, not just about business but life in general.
On Fri, he posted a Question time question about Intern Programs, where you can ask any 1 question you like on the subject of running an Intern Program, and he’ll answer it, so it got me thinking, because that’s exactly what I have been thinking of doing for sometime now (starting an intern program )…
So, my question to James is this:
How do you actually get the RIGHT people to put their hands up to become an intern?
I’m sure you’ll get applicants if you offer something of value to anyone interested in what you teach, but at the end of the day, you want to attract quality applicants who will be worth your time AND who’ll get some genuine benefit from being in your program - hence the question about attracting the good folks…
I’ll let you know what his answer is when I have it.
ciao folks - hope you had a great weekend.
Email Marketing Success Tips
I was reading through a forum just earlier tonight, when a poster asked the question:
“If my website’s main goal is to get their name and email, then how should I use a sequenced email campaign to bring them on as customers?”
After spending quite some time preparing an answer, I decided it might be worthwhile posting that answer on here for anyone seeking some tips on setting up a successful email autoresponder sequence. Enjoy.