TestMagic found a profitable way to grow with Google AdSense.
Case study : TestMagic.com : www.testmagic.com
For years, Erin Billy taught English to non-native speakers, including a three-year stint in Brazil. When he moved to San Francisco in 1997, he continued his passion for teaching through a web-based business, TestMagic.com. Today he offers online and offline classes in San Francisco for those applying to American universities and colleges. He also offers preparation courses and reference guides for high-level tests, including the GMAT, SAT, and GRE.
Approach
After losing money on the website for the first couple of years, Billy says he made a small profit by the third year. Three years after that, he has two full-time employees on the payroll, and contracts with five teachers for classroom training. Now his challenge is to grow the business and make it more profitable. Currently, he gets about 60,000 daily page views from 3,000 unique visitors. To make money from that traffic, he has tried a variety of advertising strategies. "I've tried most of the media types I can think of," he says.
"Getting started was a breeze, and right away, I began to make money." |
Billy doesn't like subjecting his users to annoying pop-ups and interstitials. He says he "moved up the ladder of affiliate programs," starting with those that are easy to get in, but pay poorly. He managed to move into a more selective affiliate position, but the programs he chose kept a sizable share of revenue, and several didn't pay out for 90 days. Despite the drawbacks, he's maintained several affiliate relationships. He also has a deal with one direct advertiser.
When Billy heard about the Google AdSense™ contextual advertising program through an ASP forum, he recalls thinking, "If Google is doing it, it's worth a try." He tested AdSense by putting the bit of required code onto a few pages of TestMagic. "Getting started was a breeze," he says, "and right away, I began to make money." So he quickly incorporated AdSense on virtually all of the site's pages.
Results
"Good advertising gives people more options, more information," Billy says. "And text ads are my all-around favorites," adding that, "It's great that Google chooses the best combination of relevance and high-paying ads." Now he gets "very impressive" AdSense revenue – about four times what he typically gets from all affiliate programs and ad networks combined. Billy invests this additional income in TestMagic to give his users more of what they want. "I can now afford to outsource some technical and creative work that I previously had to do myself. The ad revenue helps me speed things up."
"I can now afford to outsource some technical and creative work that I previously had to do myself. AdSense revenue helps me speed things up." |
Billy takes advantage of two AdSense features in particular. One of them, alternate ads, enables Billy to specify an image or ad server when there are no suitably targeted ads available from Google. (An unexpected effect of using this feature is that he has decreased his use of ad networks, and now uses them primarily to ensure that his ad space is always used effectively.) He also uses the custom color palette to make sure that the ad appearance "fits in with the site overall, because I don't want to alienate my users."
Billy believes that AdSense revenue "has infused small publishers and webmasters like me with cash they could never have had before." And he continues, "I honestly believe that AdSense is helping users in a ‘second wave' of the Internet. It's a great equalizer, enabling people like me with a lot of knowledge and a useful service, but not much financial backing, to build a business that makes money." So when associates ask, Billy's advice is "start using AdSense right away."
About Google AdSense
Google AdSense is a program enabling online businesses to earn revenue from serving ads precisely targeted to specific web content and search pages. A broad universe of sites profit from AdSense, with service levels ranging from online sign-up to dedicated support management. Google's thousands of advertisers also benefit from AdSense by gaining exposure on sites across the Google Network, including AOL, Ask.com, Lycos, and EarthLink. Visit www.google.com/adsense.
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