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CAUTION
Please note that this blog post was originally written in German and has been translated for your convenience. Although every effort has been made to ensure accuracy, there may be translation errors. I apologize for any discrepancies or misunderstandings that may result from the translation and I am grateful for any corrections in the comments or via mail.
Writing and publishing a blog is associated with some expenses. First and foremost, writing reasonably helpful blog posts takes quite a bit of time. Furthermore, my servers also cost money, which I need for publishing.
I’m not complaining, though, because I enjoy it. Nevertheless, I thought it would be nice to maybe get a little compensation. The primary sources of income so far have been mainly my Netcup affiliate links, coupons, and Amazon affiliate links. What I particularly like about these advertising sources is that they are minimally disruptive. With both Netcup and Amazon, the visitor has no disadvantage if he uses my link; it can even be advantageous in the case of Netcup. The same applies to my Hetzner advertising links.
Google Ads
However, I wanted to try out Google Ads because I get an average of less than 5 € per month from affiliate links. I created an Adsense account and added the site.
Initial Configuration
I chose to have automatic ads but didn’t want any annoying anchors or full-screen ads between page views. Also, I did not wish to use third-party cookies and no personalized advertising. On some pages, I also prohibited advertising. Moreover, the number of ad banners per page was limited to one. Essentially, I wanted to avoid unnecessarily disturbing visitors or spreading their data beyond necessary. I found the settings options good so far; I could also preview what the page would look like with ads.
Integration into the Blog
Google offers a basically simple integration via a script. But for React, it doesn’t work that easily. After some adjustments, the script was on my Gatsby (React.js) website. I adjusted my privacy policy, and the ads went live. However, it didn’t go immediately; Google had to review something before displaying ads.
After a few days, I then saw the first ad. You’re not allowed to click on it yourself; I refrained from doing so.
Problems
Then the problems began.
Data Protection Related Message
Ads were rarely displayed; I thought it could be because I don’t allow personalized advertising. So, I chose in Google Adsense that I would like to have a GDPR-compliant message for user consent and that personalized advertising will be displayed with explicit permission.
Has any of my visitors seen this message? I don’t think so. Why that was the case, I also do not know. I could not call up this message; the cookie could not be set either.
Connection to External Sites
What was set, however, were connections to external domains. And this was not for one, but Doubleclick, Google, Googleadservices, and Googlesyndication. Why is this necessary? Unclear. But it bothers me; I also like to look at other sites to see what connections are made and get annoyed when all sorts of things are found there.
Allowed Advertising
Under Google Adsense, you can check which ad providers can be displayed or block past providers. However, you can also block based on topics. I thought I could create my own personalized advertising this way and block all topics that do not have much to do with my blog. Additionally, I wanted to block topics representing competition to my employer. But that was not possible. You are only allowed to block a certain number of categories.
After that, all other categories are marked as too large to block. Why am I allowed to block fewer categories than I would like?
Optimization Test
Afterwards, I found the option to run an optimization test. It was supposed to ensure that up to two banners could be displayed for 50% of visitors. For the other 50%, it would remain at one. This way you could see how the earnings develop in these two test groups. After a few days, I checked how the test groups were doing.
Although there were over 1700 impressions, no results were shown to me. Instead, do you have to wait 90 days? Why is it so difficult for me to determine whether the 800 impressions of the test group performed better? So, if Google is already collecting my data, then they should also please show it to me. Whether they are meaningful, I can decide for myself.
Earnings
But, well, all that can still be tolerated if you get enough money.
Firstly, it is such that Google only pays out anything from a contribution of 70 €; before that, the money is only collected in the account.
Secondly, a click on an ad brought an average of 0.26 €. An impression (i.e., once in the field of vision without a click) less than 0.001 €. But not that many people click on it, which I can understand. As I said, I also don’t want to plaster everything with ads.
Conclusion
My optimization test shows that the earnings from Google Adsense are insufficient to continue using it. Accordingly, the ads will disappear from my site for now.
For the time being, I’ll stick with the affiliate links. Maybe I’ll integrate a Buy Me a Coffee button or consider other things to support my work.
What do you think about Google advertising on websites?