Does this make any sense to you? I just noticed that they are filling ad spots with Adsense ads. I mean, this one on the top in the leaderboard position makes no sense to me at all. First off, Adsense in a leaderboard converts horribly. Secondly, why aren’t they running paid ads in that spot?

Wait, I think I know why… Because the ads are completely overpriced. I got a rate card from them earlier in the year, after 3 attempts to ask for one, and I can tell you that they wanted like $50k to do a run of ads. Are you kidding me?

Look, Technorati has a new CEO, and I hope they kick things back for the better for themselves. But as of right now, I’m not sure they even have a plan? I did talk to some guy from Technorati at the Blogworld show and he assured me they have a plan…

But I’ll believe it when I see it. So I’ll continue to be disappointed and confused by their actions. How about you?

I think I need to write a post about how I would save Technorati. Although, I did that for Icerocket and nobody listened or made any of my changes.

This is a follow up to a post made in 2005, referenced at Problogger.net.

Google changed the way Adsense ads are clicked today and many are up in arms about it.

“Make money online” or pro-bloggers don’t use Google Adsense much. Why? Because it doesn’t work on these types of blogs. Guys like Shoemoney, John Chow, Zac Johnson and Problogger have found, and proven, that using Adsense on their blogs is a waste of time.

Yet… there is somehow some perpetual meme floating about that “Adsense makes everyone a ton of money”. I’m not sure how it got that way, but it’s reality. I’ve been talking about this for years. The truth is, bloggers don’t make money from Adsense.

The people who make money from Adsense are publishers of websites. Sites like:
AskDaveTaylor.com
or AsktheBuilder.com,
or Darren’s Digital Photography Blog.

Why do those sites make money with Adsense and regular type blogs don’t? Because they’re providing a different type of information, to a different audience.

AskDaveTaylor provides tech tips, but not to regular readers. His base is new traffic, found through organic search results based off of his excellent problem solving content. Same thing with AsktheBuilder.com. Therefore, when a new reader comes to the site, they’re looking for a solution to their problem, and when they see an ad (like Adsense) that is relevant and solves their problem, they usually click on it.

A blog’s readers are different. They are regular readers who have come to read what you have to say, not to have a problem solved, therefore, they’re not looking for a solution really, but instead just there to listen to you. This equals less clicks.

If you have a blog, chances are that Adsense isn’t going to make you any real money unless you’re doing millions of impressions a month. But if you are doing that, you should be selling your own sponsorship ads anyway :_)

You can now log in to Adsense and choose the Adsense for Video, which I just did.

Update: Ads not showing up in blog entry, so I removed the examples. Anyone have a fix for posting the code in a blog entry?

Check out my other blog at AsktheBlogger.com, or Jake’s blog for a great view of it in action.

Here’s a video of how to setup your new Google Adsense video ad units. Hat tip Shawn at Affiliatetip.com.

In addition, here’s a video from the video product team at Google explaining it all.

Game on for video publishers. There is officially no reason to not get into the video business. In another HUGE move by GoogTube, they have announced that they’ll begin showing videos as ad on “other” websites. What does this mean? Let’s examine it.

With the new twist, websites participating in AdSense now can sign up to specify the kinds of YouTube videos they want shown on their pages. A website focused on automobiles, for instance, might want to display YouTube videos about cars and other vehicles.

Why is this big bucks for YouTube partners? Because imagine this. If you are a selected partner, and you have let’s say 100 high-quality videos about auto repair, all kinds of car sites can now choose to put an Adsense formatted video ad in their sites, distributing your video to possibly millions and millions of their viewers.

Do the math. Let’s say you have hundreds of videos in a niche and you’re one of only a handful of trusted partners of YouTube. Your videos have the potential to be pushed to thousands and thousands of websites instantly, of which you share in the profit of the ads with the website publisher.

Take a YouTube partner like Tim Carter of Askthebuilder.com. How many home improvement websites are out there now? 100,000 or more, right? Probably. His videos can now be served to all of those websites (if they choose it). So now Tim has to only focus on creating high-quality videos, and YouTube will distribute them over, and over and over and give him his cut.

Read/Write Web is right…

It’s a simple story, but if it is true it is going to blow the world of online video and advertising wide open.

It’s true, and it WILL blow the doors off the video industry.

Start making those videos, and figuring out how you’re going to get on the YouTube publisher/partner list. I can already tell you how to do it.

Make high-quality videos. That’s it. Make a lot of them.

More at Techmeme.

You thought I was done helping others make money online when I sold BlogKits eh? Not quite. Starting today, I’m accepting only 100 beta testing applications for my latest project called Scratchback.com.

The press release goes out later this week, but loyal JimKukral.com blog readers get the scoop early of course, and can apply for one of the spots early as well. I’m thinking they’re going to go fast though, so sign up now if you’ll want to have an invitation to the private beta in August.

So what is Scratchback.com?

I’m not revealing the juicy details as of yet. Beta users will get a sneak peek though. All I will say for now is that it is an online advertising solution similar to things like Chitika, Blogads, AuctionAds or TextLinkAds and Adbrite. Similar in that it’s a publishing solution, but totally different and unique in how it works.

It’s mostly unique because it’s fun. In fact, the entire model is based around fun, not “making money online”.

I’ve been building this project in my head for 3-years now, and it’s almost done. I’m looking forward to sharing it with you and having some fun!

Ready to make money as a web publisher? Here’s a neat little Google Adsense commercial that I found at my Making Money Online video channel at Magnify.net.

I know MANY a friend who has made TONS of money from Google as a publisher. There’s still time to get on the $$$ bandwagon.

This is only the first step. The free ride is over. I told you so.

Some online publishers may get an unwelcome jolt on June 1st. Google, which provides thousands of ads to websites through it’s AdSense program, will shut off adds to certain websites beginning Friday.

Sites which are heavy in ads but light in content may be bumped from Google’s AdSense program. Several so-called online publishers who have ads with little content have already received emails saying their websites will be dropped from the AdSense program. Google says these sites influence search results, not necessarily for the good of users, by pointing users searching for specific products to these sites. Once they click through, the user may get the information they are looking for but they also may only find an ad or picture related to that product.

The change is scheduled for June 1. Google says, the clean up will affect the Internet, primarily by cleaning up search results so that users don’t click through to a site filled with ads but with no content to support the ads.

Read full report at Bizreport.com.

Google is smart, we all know this. Looks like the video ads are about to come fast and furious. The Inside Adsense blog put out a clarification about how they will work and look.

New Sizes…

This week marked the one-year anniversary of the launch of click-to-play video ads. To that end, we thought it’d be fitting to introduce three new members of our click-to-play video ads family: the 728×90 Leaderboard, the 120×600 Skyscraper, and the 160×600 Wide Skyscraper. Previously, video ads were only enabled for the 300×250 Medium Rectangle, the 336×280 Large Rectangle, the 200×200 Small Square, and the 250×250 Square.

But how can I be sure I’ll make money with these video ads?

Generating earnings with videos ads in these new formats will also remain the same. If the advertiser has chosen to display the click-to-play video ad as a cost-per-thousand impression (CPM) ad, you will be paid for every valid impression of the static image, regardless of plays or clicks to the advertiser’s site.

If the click-to-play video ad is a cost-per-click (CPC) ad, you’ll generate earnings from valid clicks to the advertiser’s site rather than clicks on the play button. In either case, you and your site visitors are free to watch the video as frequently as you like. Please keep in mind that you’ll need to be opted into image ads in order to receive video ads, but we aren’t able to guarantee that video ads will always be available for your content.

Pretty nifty.

Loren is right. I’m right. Start doing video right now. Again, you are going to lose if you don’t.