The Great PPC/CTR decline

[Acro]

Here's a chart showing how my portfolio declined with sedo over the course of a year.

In Yellow, the CTR: from 13.68% CTR the drop is now down to 5.8% - that's using the same domains with the same keywords and templates.

In Orange, the PPC. From an average of $0.21 the current monthly average is $0.17

So what is going on?

sedo's lack of optimization for search engines such as Google has caused many domains to fall off the "face of the earth". Sure, the type-in traffic is still there, but search and locate any domain parked at Sedo and in the description you will see Sedo's own promotion "for sale" etc. No keywords meta tags, no description.

Secondly, many domains despite all attempts for optimization display unrelated content, at least 50% of the time. It seems that Sedo alternates between two - maybe more - sets of content, some of which is related and some has nothing to do whatsoever with either the category or the keywords used. On top of that, some innocent domains fall victim to displaying adult ads. I had to move these away from Sedo to avoid further damage as they were generics unrelated to anything adult-oriented.

The templates: there are not enough of them. The decline in CTR is an indication that frequent visitors are now trained to recognize the Sedo landers as simply ad pages and don't click on them anymore. This means that despite the continuity of traffic, the visitors are driven away eventually not by the particular domain but by its look that they have seen elsewhere. Other companies, such as Parked.com now offer full customization of the template with provision for adding related content. This offers the benefit of making any given lander distinct from any other, actually offering content & visibility in the search engines.

PPC-wise, Sedo has simply become "#1" - in retaining a large chunk of its payouts to themselves, that is. There is no other explanation. Google is thriving, their stock is at an all time high of $677 per share.

Sedo has announced a gift hunt for the holidays that I personally find insulting. I don't need glass beads when I give Sedo my traffic so that they can claim they are #1 with millions of parked names. Sedo's value for a potential sale to an investing venture depends on the revenue it generates, this could explain the drop in the past 12 months across the board for PPC.

Two months ago I moved my zero-clickers from Sedo to Parked.com and at the current rate I will be making $1,400 a year from that chunk - money that I would never see if I left them at Sedo.

The chart below speaks for itself. It's a downhill course for the domainer - an equally proportional uphill course for Sedo's finances.

This Christmas do yourself a favor and run some stats, then decide whether you want to make more $$$$ or you want coupon revenue to get that Sedo-branded iPod.

[Dale Hubbard]

Excellent post Theo. Looking to some answers from sedo as I consider moving many domains to them based upon their ability to create sales regardless of income. Seems to me like sedo is a dichotomy - sell or earn.

[Acro]

Google stock has reached $698.50 a share in afterhours trading.

And still not a peep from sedo.

[JackRaymer]

My CTR in sedo is never high.

[Domainator]

Great post acro...I am experiencing the same declines....

[domainah]

same here..as soon as a keyword pays well it will change to some BS CPC..I think I will give Parked.com a try soon, so far I have just been too lazy to switch over

[Acro]

The horror continued yesterday as well - a Halloween special.

[katherine]

I have checked my stats, October is a horrible month with an all-time low of 5.61%. I think it's been a bad month for everyone... but my revenue is just the same as last month. Nonetheless I am now devoting more time to development.

[Acro]

Google at $712 per share. sedo at $0.10 per click.

[etphotog]

Google at $712 per share. sedo at $0.10 per click.

I've got a little Google stock, but it doesn't make me happy about the low click rate. Maybe all the google shareholders on this board need to show up at the next shareholders' meeting wake them up.

[Gerry]

I wonder if anyone is connecting the dots on Google's expenditures (Google phone, Google getting into the social networking) and Google being sedo's feed...

...Yahoo going into the cellular phone foray not as a cellular phone company but offering deals to Asian phone companies for partnerships and also providing the ad feeds for Parked...

Ask.com recent's heavy bombardment of television spots especially on NFL Sunday games at Prime Time and being the ad feeds for Bodis...

It is all speculation, but I have domains at Bodis, sedo, and NameDrive and find it odd that everyone is talking about dismal earnings for the last month or more. And hearing the same noise from the Parked crowd.

All of these recent and current and future purchases and buys and ventures are going to take tons of cash...literally, tons of cash.

It is all speculation, especially with the tons of cash these mega SE's have on hand, but why tap into those reserves when stock is doing so great, shareholders are happy, yet there is still a way to buy up company after company after company. How? Less pay out per click.

The reason I bring this up, a few years back, all my domain were at Domain Sponsor. They were flat out putting everyone to shame. Then all of a sudden they supposedly had a server upgrade and updated software.

Next thing you know, PPC revenue dropped overall by 80%, some cases even more. Within three months the company was sold. No response to emails, no explanation given for the sudden decline and drop...it was as if every thing evaporated into thin air.

My contention is they were looking for a buyer and held back the PPC to pad the books to look attractive to prospective buyers.

Is that going on with Sedo? With Parked? Doubtful.

When we get those folks telling us they have no answers for what is going on, we can choose to believe or not. But as an industry wide plummet? Coincidental? All parking companies? At the same time?

I have a feeling that these providers are holding back the PPC as they are about to do battle for global supremacy the likes have never been seen. The time appears now to fatten up their coffers as they all seem to be on a buying spree.

And what better way to fatten up than to pay out less while still having a steady stream come in.

This is simply a theory, nothing proven, pure conjecture. But I look back at what happened years ago and see what I am seeing now and am simply trying to connect the dots.

[Acro]

I have one rule that I live by: math does not lie.

[Acro]

The decline continues. My referring/partner revenue has dropped by the same percentage. That's a clear indication sedo has dropped their pants to Google.

[wolfis.com]

should a post like this raise red flags ?

sedo does not respond equals clearly to sedo does not care .

so this is how it works :

* advertising bugdet is at an all time high
( increased by up to 30 % per anno in some countries versa 12 month ago)

* google stock value at an all time high

* google payouts ( according to a google source) did not see an major reduction over the past 12 month

so the only question remaining is - why could be your revenue so much lower over the past 12 month ?

think about it !



so someone is lying or someone is ripping you off - it is that simple !
( i am not saying who - i am sure you can figure it out for yourself )

however instead of complaining how bad it is getting and being completely ignored
(which only shows how much they care for your business ) i myself are testing many different avenues - thank goodness there are a lot of ppc services out there.

[Acro]

I expect no response by our otherwise busy PR-deliverer, Monica, in the am.

November's stats, already at 1/3 of the month, look even worse.

[NameYourself]

I believe there has been a decline in CTR and RPC across the board over this past year. It would be interesting to see stats from people who use other companies as well. If there is a decline overall, that could indicate google is keeping a larger share of the pie than before. Either that, or more browsers/software/users choose to block parked pages. Either way, no one benefits in a monopolisitc market unless they are the monopoly. Yahoo needs to get their act together and create greater competition. When online advertising dollars continue to rise, but the end share continues to shrink, someone has too much control.

[discovernow]

sedo is good for buying and selling domains. As for parking domains they were the worst paying out of all the parking companies I tested.

[Sleepys]

sedo is good for buying and selling domains. As for parking domains they were the worst paying out of all the parking companies I tested.

It is true that regular sedo is not a great parking provider and does not pay much, but I think that Sedopro is very competetive with the other providers and pays me more than the other guys, despite the steady decline, which seems no worse at Sedo than at other companies.

[Acro]

Are you disputing my stats? sedo is very much worse than other places in that particular trend. I have not witnessed any such decline in Parked or NameDrive.

Having a Pro account makes no difference in revenue. It only gathers a "bonus". But it seems to be a bonus based on bogus...

[wolfis.com]

Theo is correct !

we are already talking about sedopro .

i myself use most of the known PPC providers including ND and DS which both also use google and evenso there is a small decline , it is nothing compared to sedo or sedo pro - sedo's payouts completely crashed.