New Web Revenue Program Looks Promising
Well, the pool of resources for generating income from your
website is growing. It's an exciting time for webmasters and
bloggers alike.
The latest addition is a program offered by a company named
Chitika.
Now, the neat thing about Chitika is that it can be used as both
a contextual advertisement (meaning the ads will automatically
be targeted to the content of the page) and a keyword-derived
advertisement. When set as a keyword ad, it is not considered
contextual, and it may be placed on the same page with Google
AdSense ads and Yahoo Publisher Network ads. We'll get into that
more later.
The Chitika ads show an image of a product along with anywhere
from two to four tabs which reveal new content with each mouse
over. This actually offers a small interactive feel to your web
page. As of this writing, the tabs read description, search,
best deals and reviews.
The ads are attractive and organized, and, most importantly,
manage to avoid that gaudy appearance which comes with some ad
programs.
>From the Chitika site, users can choose from ten different ad
sizes which vary enough to find the perfect one for you site.
Webmasters can also alter the color of the ads and blend them
into their site's theme and feel.
The inventory from Chitika is rather large but contains mostly
products. Our main site, http://www.NJLawman.com, is
about police and law enforcement issues, and finding product ads
which would perform well in the context of a law enforcement
website has been challenging.
Sites covering technology and related issues would probably do
better since there is a seemingly never-ending supply of cell
phone, computer, and iPod advertisements.
Earnings per click (EPC) has also been challenging for our site,
but we have been using keyword ads that are generally low
paying. There have been many posts, though, in top-shelf
webmaster forums reporting high earnings.
Click through rate (CTR) has been low for us, however, our
audience is primarily made up of police officers, so cell phone
and iPod ads are clearly not targeted. Remember, as much as
everyone loves great EPC, if your ads are not targeted to your
site's audience, they will probably get very few clicks.
The "Reports" page of the Chitika control panel is very basic
and doesn't even compare to that offered by AdSense and YPN.
However, Chitika has assured they are working on it and there's
more to come.
Finally, as touched on above, one of the great features of
Chitika is the ability to place Chitika ads on pages with
AdSense or YPN. Both of those programs prohibit placing other
contextual advertising on the same page with their ads. However,
when you set your Chitika ads to be keyword targeted, they are
not considered contextual, and you may place them on a page
which contains AdSense or YPN ads. This is excellent for
maximizing revenue.
All in all, we give high marks to the Chitika program, but it
won't be for everyone. You should, though, try it out and see if
it's for you.
Good luck and good earnings!