A couple of weeks ago I stuck Google AdSense ads on the right sidebar of this blog. I won’t get rich on the proceeds unless I get very, very old … but it should pay for my server. Here’s my question, though:
I’d really like to know. What kinds of posts generate clicks?
Whether I decide to write more of those or not is another question, but it’d be nice to know. Also, which ads enticed the click?
As far as I can see – and I’ve only re-enabled ads on this site a couple of weeks ago – there is no way to track or find this information. The only tracking information you can generate is based on what you put into the system: channels.
Well, that’s helpful for those who have multiple blogs (like me). You can set up a channel for each blog and monitor which one are profitable. But that’s not very fine-grained data … and I’m not going to set up a channel for each post.
Why the secrecy?
Why is this information not readily available? Wouldn’t it be in Google’s best interests to have bloggers and site owners more able to write the kinds of posts that generate clicks?
Would this data enable click fraud artists?
I assume there are reasons not to do this. I assume that Google has thought of this and decided not to do it. And I further assume that perhaps they are concerned about fraud and gaming the system.
But for the life of me I can’t figure out why.
[tags] adsense, google, adwords, data, clicks, john koetsier [/tags]