April 16, 2008
More evidence points to Google’s faltering clicks
The clicking habits of Google’s US users continue to cause concern.
For the third month in a row, the number of “paid clicks” (or impressions on adverts) in the US was little changed in March from a year ago. That is according to data from comScore that started to seep out late on Tuesday (the information is given first to analysts before being made public officially later.)
Overall, for the first quarter, Google’s paid clicks rose only 2 per cent, despite a big jump in the number of searches in the same period.
How much of this is due to Google improving the quality of its market by weeding out low-value or unintentional clicks (which could lead to an off-setting jump in revenue per click,) and how much does it reflect a cyclical downturn? John Aiken at Majestic Research says he things it’s 75 per cent cyclical (and at least one Google executive has hinted that economic weakness is an issue.) If so, that could hit the entire internet sector. The results will be out on Thursday.
[…] FT.com | Tech Blog | More evidence points to Google’s faltering clicks The clicking habits of Google’s US users continue to cause concern. (tags: GOOGLE) […]
Posted by: links for 2008-04-16 | April 16th, 2008 at 5:42 pm | Report this commentI have ‘Google Ads’ on my blog ‘Serge the Concierge’ for over a year now and noticed a significant drop in the past few months.
This might be caused as much by the relatively poor quality of the ads as the current economic conditions.
The secret sauce of online advertising might not be more but rather better and more relevant (value added) adverts or even sponsorships/ partnerships (clearly highlighted) between site owners/ publishers and advertisers.
My few cents
Serge Lescouarnec
Posted by: Serge Lescouarnec | April 17th, 2008 at 8:16 pm | Report this comment‘The French Guy from New Jersey’
http://www.sergetheconcierge.com