RevenueQuest

I just received an e-mail from Yahoo! Search Marketing (Yahoo! Search Marketing is what runs the ads on Yahoo! Publisher Network) and it looks like they will be implementing smart pricing on their publishers.Smart pricing is done to try to decrease the amount of clicks from sites that do not convert well. The CPC or amount paid out to the publisher being smart clicked will go down. It is likely that anyone putting YPN on sites with little or no content will be smart priced. But no promises.

The e-mail reads (Note: this was sent to advertisers, not publishers displaying ads):

• We’ll evaluate the quality of traffic from our distribution partners’ sites.
• Your click charges can be discounted based on the value of that traffic.
• Discounts will automatically be applied to your account.

What is Changing?
Previously all traffic was treated the same—you were charged the same for traffic from all web sites within our network. With quality-based pricing, you may be charged less for certain clicks than you normally would pay, depending on the overall quality of the websites that are providing this traffic to you. As a result, your click charges can decrease.

How will Click Charges be Discounted?
“Quality” is calculated based on conversion rates and other measurements of the ability to deliver more interested and valuable customers to you from particular distribution partner sites. Discounts will be automatically applied to your account.

When will this Start?
This feature will roll out beginning today, and we plan to continue to expand it over time. This is just one of the things we’re doing, along with future projects like domain-level blocking, to help increase the quality and value of traffic that we deliver to you.

What Do I Need to Do?
There’s nothing you need to do to receive a discount—your click charges may be discounted based on the quality of traffic you receive. Keep in mind that the amount of the discounts may vary between advertisers: Some may experience a noticeable decrease in overall cost-per-click, while others may experience only a small decrease in spend.

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I will have to keep an eye on my earnings as I use YPN on most of my sites. The good news is that if you are running a CPC campaign with Yahoo! Search Marketing, your spending may go down.

UPDATE: I received an e-mail from YPN as well. This definitely sounds like Smart Pricing.

“In an ongoing effort to strengthen our Sponsored Search and Content Match marketplaces, Yahoo! will be introducing a new traffic quality feature called “quality-based pricing”. This feature is rolling out beginning today and we plan to continue to expand it over time.

Quality-based pricing will give us the ability to price traffic commensurate with the value that advertisers receive from each traffic source. We recognize that this approach may have an impact on how you operate your business, and as a valued Yahoo! publisher we wanted to let you know about this new feature, as you may notice fluctuations in your Yahoo! Publisher Network earnings.

Quality-based pricing reinforces our overall commitment to deliver long-term success for our distribution partners, a high-quality experience for users and high-value traffic to our advertisers. We are excited about this initiative, and plan to work closely with you as we roll out these features across our network.”

Popularity: 7% [?]

Definitely has been long anticipated. The Agloco (aff) Viewbar is finally available for download. Currently, it works with Firefox and Internet Explorer on Windows 2000, XP, and Vista. Sorry Mac users, no love yet.

For those of you who don’t know about Agloco, you can read an older post that I made regarding the viewbar in February. Basically, you will be paid for the number of hours you surf the internet with this Viewbar running. Their is a referral program which is where the money potential is.

As I write this, I just downloaded the Viewbar and am using it right now. See what you think.

Popularity: 3% [?]

Sometimes I feel like I just have so many ideas that I want to try, but in the end, nothing ever gets done. It seems like a lot of people on the internet, especially those that are trying to make a living off it, have the same problem.

Maybe it is because of the kind of person we all are. I’m sure many of you have realized it takes a different breed to want to make a living at something with pretty much no job security in a market that is arguably well over saturated.

The other possibility is that it is the nature of the internet. Lets face it, starting a new project on the internet costs almost nothing — especially when you already have things like servers and necessary software paid for. Plus, we are bombarded with news stories everyday of how Joe Shmoe came up with a simple idea, implemented it well, and is now a millionaire (or in Mark Zuckerberg’s case, the creator of Facebook, turning down a $1 billion dollar offer from Yahoo! in just a couple of years. Read the wiki.)

For me, I think it is a little bit of both. Where do you think you fit in?

So the moral of the story is don’t just keep going after new projects. If you have a great idea, write it down and put it aside. Finish what you have already started and make a goal of when you want to have it completed.

Who knows. Maybe your current project will make you the next Joe Shmoe.

Popularity: 4% [?]

I was just going through my RSS reader, and I noticed a post on Mindables about increasing your Technorati ranking. He says it works, so I’ll give it a try.

Viralink

Below is a matrix of 120 stars, I have already added a link to my blog onto one of the stars, all you need to do is copy and paste the grid into your blog and add your own link to one of the other spare stars, and tell others to do the same!

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New Addition: When I receive a ping back once you have added the Viralink to your site I will add your link to this grid, and each person who copies the grid from here will also link to your site!

Popularity: 5% [?]

With all the hype around ReviewMe and PayPerPost Direct lately (some of the action can be found on Kumiko’s Cash Quest), I thought I would take a look at PayPerPost and see what they had to offer. Apparently not much… to me anyway.

Yes, laugh all you want. I recieved an e-mail today that this blog was indeed rejected to PayPerPost. The good news is that the reason for my rejection is that in the last 90 days I have a “non-writing period” of at least 30 days. Meaning, I had a month hiatus with no posts.

Well guess what PayPerPost… it was 56 days!

Popularity: 3% [?]