Google AdSense vs Affiliate Links – Go For The Meat!

In one of “The Future of Performance Marketing” sessions at the Affiliate Summit today, Larry Adams, the product manager for affiliate marketing for the Google Affiliate Network (formerly DoubleClick Performics), has brough up an interesting observation. He has mentioned that upon analyzing statistics, they have discovered that a vast majority of affiliates on the Google Affiliate Network do not use Google AdSense on their sites. He has also said that this discovery has literally “shocked” them. No wonder why… In my own affiliate recruitment, I find that many blogs and content websites happily use Google’s AdSense units, but do not monetize their traffic via any affiliate links. Larry added that affiliates prefer affiliate ads to AdSense ads “because they make more money on” them. Affiliates prefer making $50 off an actual sale/lead as opposed to $.5 off a click on an AdSense unit’s link.

Affiliate managers, next time you find a good niche website that is perfect for the promotion of your products or services, but monetizes their traffic solely through Google AdSense, because they are not confident anything else works, send them to this blog post. They are missing out on the real monetizing opportunity.

When I was studying Latin for my linguistics degree back 15 years ago, for homework we had to learn a certain number of Latin proverbs for every new class. One of them was the “Ad praesens ova cras pullis sunt meliora” proverb, which literally meant “eggs today are better than chickens tomorrow.” In the case with website monetization, it is exactly the contrary! If “eggs” suffice for you – it’s your choice. If, however, you want the real meat – go for the affiliate marketing!