Content networks have struggled to catch on

By Mark Kimathi

Paid listings for content networks hit the scene, with the entry of Google’s Adsense in June 2003.

Back then, the advertiser paid the same cost for a click from the paid search listing as they did for clicks from content listing. Since search listings were proving to be effective, costs per click were on the rise.

Enter Adsense and advertisements served in search were showing in websites, blogs and forums.

It took a while, but advertisers started noticing discrepancies between clicks from search and those from content. Those from the content network were not doing as well as those from search. Upgrade in the bidding system in 2005 allowed an advertiser to separate search listing bids from content network. But by the time the system jiggle christened smart pacing was being rolled out, the damage had been done.

For example, in 2005, in a post in SubmitExpress.com forum titled Google Adword Search Network vs Content Network, Seaboat, a forum member, was looking for some advice.

"I’m having a campaign in Google Adwords and I found the convertion rates from content network is much lower than search network. I am thinking to turn off content network for my campaign. Can anyone tell me if it is a good idea?" The resounding answer at the time was "turn off the content network," evidence that it was not profitable for many advertisers.

Misperforming adverts

The following are some of the reasons content adverts were misperforming.

Fraudulent Clicks: Way back in 2003, Adsense was a gold mine for publishers. In some markets, a website publisher could make as much as $20 whenever a visitor clicked on an advert in their website. This encouraged unscrupulous persons employing tactics to increase the income from their website, like hiring an army of people to just click on adverts displaying on their websites.

Obviously, these were not people interested in buying anything. Marketingexperiments.com pointed out that as much as 25 per cent of clicks were fraudulent.

Adsense Arbitrage: Fraudulent clicks were outright theft with the same exact effect as fraud clicks. Arbitrage is the practice of buying low and selling high.

In Adsense arbitrage, a webmaster would build websites optimised to show Adsense ads, then referred to as Made For Adsense sites (MFA). They would then go to Adwords and bid for low priced keywords as they send them to MFA websites showing related ads of a higher price.

They would make profit in the difference between Adsense pay and Adword’s cost. This seriously depressed user experience as they clicked on advert to go to another.

Untargeted Adverts: Until some time later after launch, targeting in content network was an issue.

For example, if you run an advert for your Java coffee shop using the keyword java, your ads were at risk of showing in a web page about java scripts or one about touring java island in Indonesia.