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Why Google's clicks are declining

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Mike

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Google reduced the clickable area on Adsense text ads ... Before, a user could click anywhere on the ad and be brought to the destination. After the changes, users have to click on something that looks like a hyperlink.

"The CTR on text ads declined about 60% in the last 2 months with Googles changes, Image ads on the other hand stayed the same."
- January 4th, 2008 Marcus of Plentyoffish.com

4 months later, that little back and forth in the Google Rec Room shaved about $85 Billion (with a B) in market capitalization.

But it wasn't as stupid an idea as it might seem. You see, Adsense works in a Quasi-market place environment. The market will bid up the cost per click once the adjustment for accidental clicks is readjusted. Right now, marketers should be getting a better value per click as a higher percentage of the clicks are "real" or intentional. That will lead to higher bids per click and ultimately should be close to a break even for GOOGs bottom line.

Is the Sky Really Falling?

The problem is that in the interim, GOOG gives almost not Guidance to the stock market. Mutual Fund types are really too thick to grasp exactly what's going on, so they think that this "slowing" in the growth has to do with the potential recession effecting GOOG.

Meanwhile, the real story is that Online Advertising Spending will continue to grow at about 30% per year for at least the next 3 years and GOOG is poised to take a disproportionate amount of that growth even if nothing else they do is even marginally successful.

Source: http://www.skrenta.com/2008/02/the_real_reason_googles_clicks.html
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Opinions?

M.
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
AfternicAfternic
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wow...well look at that....your right. ...such a great year for publishers...
 
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Your right on Intel,

google is not going downhill. They are doing what they always have, refining their concept. If they don't keep improving things like click thru functionality they have nothing to sell their advertisers. What is googles unique product? Their product is quality search.
 
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yup, google actually played around with this idea a long time ago and then got rid of it, and now they've brought it back! market conditions should eventually improve publisher earnings in the long run.
 
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Er.... I still get 2 clicks for $0.01 in total.
 
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goodkarmaco said:
Your right on Intel,

google is not going downhill. They are doing what they always have, refining their concept. If they don't keep improving things like click thru functionality they have nothing to sell their advertisers. What is googles unique product? Their product is quality search.
Just for the record, before the wrong impression starts to emerge here: I am absolutely against Google, their ethics, tactics, and 95% of their solutions.
There are too many people on this planet that have been completely blindsided by a corporation that was once an innovator, a trendsetter and respectable outfit. Since Google has left their SE only platform, they have managed to enclose themselves in double standards (example: support of Yahoo), compromising privacy laws (example: archiving personal data), breaking copyright and publishing laws (example youtube), questionable/unfair business tactics (example gmail). These are the items that are just too obvious, just read through the news, past and present and you'll quickly find out that there's tons more where this came from.
Google's Search is no longer unique, it's long been leveled to the effect that Yahoo, Ask and MSN have revamped their search to be just as accurate and have actually surpassed Google's search by more customer/user oriented feature such as suggestive completion/auto complete.
What is Google's unique product? Aggressivness in the market place and a quasi open source existence that let's developers produce elements that integrate with Google. The true innovation of late, is utilizing other people's intellect to further their own cause. This is where Google truly shines and is ahead of their competition.
Anyways, back to the topic ;)

M.
 
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