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Google Launches Cost Per Action AdSense
rustybrick writes "Google has launched an invite only test of CPA (cost per action) AdSense ads. So instead of getting paid per click or per impression, you now can get paid for an action, such as a sale or lead referral."
The point of sale or is right where the money is, so it makes sense to test the market with it. I'm sure that Google would deem a direct referal to a sale to be worth more too. It will be interesting to see how the revenue for the publisher and the costs for the marketer woulr work out.
Aww, take it easy on the poor little company with the ~$200 stock shares.
(end of post)
PM me with your offer.
;-)
(sic)
RTFG - Read The F#$%ing Google!
I worked for a company back when no one cared about making money and we were looking at building something similar. One of the chief concerns we had at the time was how to prevent fraud on the part of the advertisers: ie, if a user clicks through and ultimately makes a purchase, did the advertiser properly track that and then report it back?
There are a couple of ways publishers can also loose out: for instance, if a user clicks through but doesn't make a purchase only to return to the advertiser's site the next day or week and make the purchase, will the publisher be compensated appropriately?
This is definitely a great opportunity for publishers and advertisers by increasing quality over quantity. However, there are a lot of potential pitfalls for the publisher.
Will google be able to properly intermediate? or will they tend to side with their big advertisers when issues/complaints arise?
Working at a company that manages pay-per-click ads, pay per action is something we've been waiting for a long time to come over the horizon. I'm so glad Google's rolling it out, even if it is only on a test basis.
"Clicks" are abstract concepts and very difficult to sell to less tech-savvy business people. They want a better measure of their return on investment for their ad campaigns. A number of companies offer call tracking, which is easier for businesses to grok . . . but a call != a sale . . . or even an actual lead.
This is a welcome step in the right direction, IMHO.
This is awesome news for me. This means I can spend more time at home without pants!
Every time Google comes out with a new way to pay people like me to do advertising, is almost an entire additional month that I can spend at home without any pants on. Who needs a recruiter, when I don't ever have to leave the house?
Zhrodague.net - I do projects and stuff too.
How do I trust that the advertisers will accurate report sales generated by my leads?
Help kill corporate productivity!
In my opinion, this is just Google being too shy to give their users some profit. I think it is very unrealistic that mass amounts of people will sign up to whatever Google makes them sign up for, rendering this service useless.
If Google could release a new service that is as widely used as the current pay per click or pay for impression AdSense, then THAT is something that web site authors would buy into.
But, in the past, what have we learned from Google? In one or two instances, Google has showed us how a simple, but slightly farfetched idea can turn into something brilliant.
you now can get paid for an action, such as a sale or lead referral.
I'm in. How much for the names and addresses of my soon-to-be-former friends?
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
Now, both are doing a "Cost Per Action" pricing scheme.
I still don't get it! (and sorry for nagging about it, again) Is there a single Slashdotter here who clicks on ads? (assuming you haven't got them filtered (thank you, Firefox extensions)) I'm not sure I have even done it for experimental purposes. I _never_ do it. Not the flashy ones, not the discreet text ones. Why would anyone do it? If you're looking for something, you go get it. If not, you don't want anyone telling you to go get it. Gah, giving up control of yourself like that!
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The problem is: most people on /. either know how to use Adblock (and thus don't see this kind of bullshit), or show ads themselves (being on the webmaster's side of the deal and thus being a part of the problem themselves).
For now, the "mere mortals" cope with the problem, just like they accept Windows and spyware, but with more than 33% of all http requests being relate to adverts, the situation just goes worse and worse.
Those who win: Google and advertisers.
Those who lose: users and network providers.
The current state of net advertising is that someone else is paid for stealing your time and your bandwidth.
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
There have been several ad-providers who have been using cost-per-action for some time now. An example would be available here . As I understand it, this technology is actually mature and has been put forward several times as a better way to resolve click-fraud than the "just trust us to take care of it" method used thus far by google.
How to use coral cache: http://slashdot.org.nyud.net:8090/~oscartheduck
I don't filter out google text ads because they really don't bother me.
I have occassionally clicked on them, and have, even more rarely, bought things from them. Sometimes you find relative newcomers to a particular market who provide a better price than their established competitors who have the benifit of pagerank.
That's exactly what I was thinking.
With a pay-per-click I don't really care what gets advertised on my site as long as its relevant to the content of the site (which, thanks to Google, it is). I'm getting paid for sending folks there way.
With a pay-per-action system, I'll have to care about what gets advertised on my site, because if no sale is made, I don't make any money. So I'm not going to want to advertise (say) $3,000 hottubs, because even if it does result in a sale, its probably not going to be purchased immediately after follwing my link. Likewise, I'm not going to want to advertise for sites that make it difficult to make purchases or don't effectively sell their products.
And when you think about it, why shouldn't I be paid for helping spread brand recognition, regardless of the immediate results? Billboard space isn't leased based on the number of people who make a purchase after viewing the billboard. It is leased based on the number (and demographic) of people expected to see it.
AdWords has had the capability to track "conversions" by placing pieces of javascript on "Success!" pages for quite a long time. I've used it for years and always thought of it as very useful.
Apparently it's equally been useful to google.
Please, the man has no pants on. Please don't bring up "squirting" things...
I am defenseless. Use your button. Mod me down with all of your hatred.
If everyone blocked ads you'd have no internet to block ads from.
I do click on ads, for some sites I like a lot I make sure to follow ads every now and again. But mostly I click on an add if I find the content interested, so very targeted ads are more likely to reach me. Interestingly I'd say the site I visit ads from most often is Penny Arcade, and not just out of support but because I am interested.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Why would anyone do it?
If I scan the organic results and don't find anything there, rather than moving to the second page, on occasion I'll click on a paid link. However, I only click on links that look reputable. A text ad that makes exorbitant claims or just seems like it's hucksterism won't get a click.
The advantage of well-done paid text links for the advertiser is that they can drive potential customers - people who are looking for exactly the sort of product/service you provide - to your site.
The advantage for users when such ads are done properly is that the user is likely to be fairly certain that ads coming out at the top of the list are going to be for sites that offer what the user is trying to find. It's a means of matching a buyer and a seller, rather than a way to trick potential customers into visiting a site.
To me there is nothing distasteful about advertising per se. Companies have to let people know they exist, or they'll have no customers. The use of innocuous, targeted text ads seems to me to be a good compromise between the needs of advertisers and the needs of web users. Even if a given ad link is only folllowed a very small percentage of the time, it can be worth it for the advertiser. At the same time, if I can ignore ads except when I want to scan them, as a web user I feel like I'm not being bashed over the head the way I do when I encounter popups and other bullshit from companies that just don't get it.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
This is one of the least insightful posts I've ever read. Yes, sales make money; this is true. "It will be interesting" ok, anything else?
It already does work better than per-click for many reasons. The porn industry switched from per-click to per-sale, for the most part, about 5 years ago. Of course, as always, the porn industry online is ahead of the curve.
You're worrying too much. Google has just as much interest in receiving revenue from the advertising placement as you do. If someone posts an ad for $3,000 hottubs and the conversion rate is excessively small, Google won't want to display the ad either. Instead they'll display an ad that's more likely to result in conversion, and you'll both get to prance around in happy land.
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One leads to a badly implemented site, the other to a better site which generates more sales.
The website should be payed equally because its service to the advertisers was equal.
The payment should not be related in any way to the quality of the sales machine behind the click, because that is not within the website's scope of responsibility or powers.
There are two cases in which this setup would be acceptable. One is where the webmaster can hand-pick his advertisers. The other would be one where Google's great algorithms would in practice mean high revenue. What sells directly through gpay, gets advertised, what doesn't, should use pay per click.
I find this all highly entertaining. Google's is doing what pr0n sites have prevailed and mastered long ago. Do pay per click. Get spammed by click-fraud badly. Do pay per sale.
Google will have a much harder time though (no pun intended). They are ad-brokers, and expectations and growth models are all based on the faulty pay per click model. The fraud is huge, and they are earning money from it. So while investers and stock-owners are slowly realizing this, they must now start "experimenting" with pay per sale so they are ready for the future, but no too fast, or they will be canabalizing their own income. It's all about cushioning and leveling out.
I would only want to do CPA for things that are remarkably likely to happen. I wouldn't want, for example, to have my income depend on someone ordering a laptop. In fact, Google already offers referral links for Firefox (w/ Google Toolbar, natch), Google Pack, and Picasa. (They offer it for adwords and adsense, but I find that a less likely action.) These links require not just a click, but a specific result, like downloading the app and installing it, or signing up for a certain advertising program. These are fairly likely actions, I think, and even that doesn't yield strong results. Even on a site where I have a feature that is legitimately non-IE friendly, and I offer the Firefox link right below, I don't get a strong result.
This is nothing new. Other smaller companies have been doing the same thing for a while now. It's actually quite a lucrative business, just not as fast-growing as pay-per-click.