Where is Your Phone Number?Written by Jeff Mulligan (c) 2003
There is probably a major problem lurking on your sales page right now. And it could be hurting your profits.Experts agree that one of most important factors in a successful website is credibility. This frequently translates into credibility of site owner. People are more likely to buy from somebody they believe in. Is your website as credible as it could be? People judge credibility by many subtle factors. Does design of site look professional? Is site well written? Are there typos and grammar errors strewn throughout site? Is author believable? Does author have experience in this market or with this product? These are all important factors. We also know that a strong guarantee is a key part of a successful sales page. Taken one step further, reader needs to believe he will actually get a refund if requested. And herein often lies a major inconsistency. Look at your sales page and ask yourself: Who is standing behind product? What do you provide for contact information? If there is only an e-mail address, or worse yet, no contact information at all, then you do not have a believable guarantee. If you want someone to believe that you stand behind your product you need to be reachable. Put your complete contact information on your web site. I'm not just talking about an e-mail address. Consider adding your snail mail address and even, dare I say, your phone number. At first, I worried about using this approach. I feared getting calls at all hours of night. I worried about getting overwhelmed. But, I reasoned, I could always remove phone number if it became a problem.
| | How Smart Pricing Effects AdSense (TM) Publisher Revenues Written by Dave Lavinsky
I constantly receive phone calls from clients, prospective clients and reporters asking same question – what percent of keyword price does Google pay AdSense (TM) publishers. While AdSense Standard Terms and Conditions explicitly forbid disclosing such information, range I often give is 20% to 50% based on numerous conversations I have had with AdSense publishers.While precise percentage is not clear, what is evident is that percentage that Google pays publishers has gone down significantly since April 2004. It was at this time that Google announced it would be lowering price of ads (i.e., charging AdWords(TM) clients less) that appear on sites of AdSense publishers. Susan Wojcicki, Director of Product Management for Google, stated that this change came from requests of advertisers who wanted different pricing on clicks from search and content ads. Google stated that it considered search-based ads more targeted than content ads, and that they therefore generated more clicks and revenue for advertisers. However, Google did realize that some content ads perform as well as search-based ads. As a result, “Smart Pricing” was born. Smart Pricing adjusts value of clicks based on a number of factors such as time of day, type of content, and conversion tracking. The latter, conversion tracking, measures how often a click on an ad produces a desired action for advertiser, such as a product sale, newsletter signup, etc. The example Google gave for Smart Pricing was that “a click on an ad for digital cameras on a web page about photography tips may be worth less than a click on same ad appearing next to a review of digital cameras.”
|
