Hey there,
as you may have guessed from your inbox, “Adsense is not dead … and with this new course it’s going to …” well, make Sean Donahoe a few fistful of dollars.
Nothing wrong with Sean, …
probably nothing wrong with Sean’s course …
EVERYTHING wrong with Adsense as used by most “passive income” oriented IMers.
Here’s the deal:
Google Adsense was designed to be an additional monetization method for sites that already
- provide a good user experience (they are a high-quality ‘product’ in some sense), and
- have ‘natural’ traffic (as a result of providing that good user-experience)
What you get taught in pretty much ANY Adsense ‘course’ is to build a site specifically for Adsense.
That’s MFA (“made for Adsense”) – and that’s something pretty much everybody hates … Google, the visitors to that site and your bank-account:
yes, this is yet another one of those methods that makes the course-creator good money, but is VERY UNLIKELY to make you any decent money.
Plus, if you’re not already suffering from ADD, it’s just another shiny magic bomb-shell that’s pulling your attention in yet another direction, …
… rather than you focusing on what matters:
creating a ‘product’ that truly WOWs visitors.
If you have a product, and I put it in quotes above, because it doesn’t have to be something you ship, or people download, a site that provides an overall great user-experience can be a product, THEN, by all means, add Adsense to make a little bit of extra money.
But, never ever make build something with the goal of monetizing it with Adsense.
In all likelihood you’ll end up with MFA, which is another way of saying SPAM.
And SPAM sucks – I hope you agree.
Just for kicks then …
what are products that truly WOW you?
I’ll start my list here:
- Joy Michaud’s Peppersbypost.biz – awesome chillies, but more importantly: a terrific buying experience and customer service (that’s 3 products right there)
- Alia K. – a secretary at Siemens in Oxford, she’s one of those rare people who makes you feel you’re the centre of the Universe
- Jackie Wilson on the Jerry Lee Lewis show in 1971: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m58qltynH1g
ok, ok, the above 3 are just things that make me very, very happy, so here are 3 top ‘products’ in the traditional sense:
- Jules Watkins’ iVideoHeros ivideoheros.com – it’s a classy product that is evergreen (well, as long as mobile phones with video functionality are around;-), done by someone who truly cares, and at the same time is a truly inspirational “Internet Marketing done right” story.
- Glenn Livingston’s endlesstrafficmachine.com – a fantastic fundamental concept EVERYONE doing anything online MUST understand – delivered again by a guy who cares, and again with a story that shows you that anyone can make it happen. Plus, the basic ‘idea’ is free right there on that page. See also the interview on this site.
- and guess what, then it’s starting to get really thin on the ground … whereas my list of products that anti-wow me for some reason or another is pretty much endless.