adsense

Typically webmasters start out with Adsense as their revenue stream. While it’s easiest and definitely quick to use, Adsense is not always the best performer if you’re looking to earn money online from your websites. With Adsense you’ll always run into a couple problems.

1. You can’t presell. With an affiliate link, you can talk about the product so your visitor knows what to expect when they get to the advertisers page. You can give them the price and details, and if they still click, they’re likely to buy since they already know everything. If that isn’t the product they’re looking for, they’ll continue browsing your site. You’ll make a sale, or keep a visitor. With Adsense you don’t get the chance to do either.

2. You’ll earn less. While I can’t say that every single one of my sites that has affiliate links makes more with those affiliate links, a majority do.

3. All your eggs in one basket. If all of your income is coming from one source and something happens to that source, your revenue drops to $0.

4. Unknown revenue share. This has always been the biggest issue with me. Google doesn’t tell you how much you’re going to earn. In fact, they tell you how much they will give you per click, after you send them the clicks. It’s totally backwards but until they have a reason to give you that info, they never will.

Moving away from Adsense is tough, and I wouldn’t suggest dumping it all together. Start slow, remove the ads from one page and replace it with affiliate links. Test it for a month and see what the revenue is like when compared to Adsense.