AdSense Versus Yahoo Publisher Network

The word is out that Google is no more alone in the world of contextual advertising, and Yahoo had come out with a beta program to take its rightful place. As we know it, it was goto.com, which became Overture that Yahoo bought in 2003 that pioneered the pay-per-click ad method. AdSense and the new Yahoo Publisher Network are an extension advertising system based on what was started years back, where text ads pop up on Web sites of those who have signed up for such programs according to the content that is being displayed at a given time, deriving them the name "contextual advertising".

What happens is, like any ad display if a visiting customer clicks through the ads the site will make a certain amount of money even if the customer does not buy anything. Many sites had been eking money through such a system even if the money generated does not seem to be much, but the size of the visitors is the main catalyst in making a difference. If the size of the traffic of a site is high, the number of the click-through could be high too, resulting in generating reasonably good revenue.

According to various reports there is not much difference between the two programs, except that YPN is said to pay a bit more money, which is a standard ploy of advertising where it is done to attract more customers. The fact that the YPN service is still at the beta stage is pronounced by the lack of ads that are displayed on the Web sites for the obvious reason that the program is starting out and eventually both the quality and the quantity aspect of the variety of the ads are expected to pick up.

It is good news for advertisers because competition always breeds good service no matter what it does to those who are competing and it is always the one that has good offerings that will finish ahead. It is not only that, competition always forces those who are competing to come up with their best in order not to fall behind, which will result in most cases in a high level of innovation. It is also known to be a good means of checking the cost of advertising, which had been on a steep rise for some time now, and the number of players among the big search engines is expected to rise as Microsoft is also in the process of coming up with its own version. This will definitely give a respite for the advertisers who must have felt the bite as they have to foot every click-through bill, which Google shares with those Web sites that were able to create an outlet for the various ads.

Since YPN is a newcomer on the scene, it is only natural if it tries to capitalize on the weak points of its competitor, and one of the major steps it has taken is the whole undertaking is proactive. As a new program, YPN has upped its customer service where they are taking in feed-backs enforce, while at the same time effort to reach out customers is stepped up so that many users will know its arrival on the scene.

Among the few minor disadvantages cited were the text size could still have a problem of fitting on some Web sites as the ads cannot adjust according to available space on the site even if it is possible to choose various sizes on the outset by simply clicking into the YPN control panel. There is also a cited problem with the color pattern chosen for the ads because it does not work with some sites if they have similar base color, even if the color of the ad also could be chosen in advance from the same control panel. These kinds of problems, however, are part of beta programs, and eventually rectifying them is possible.

If there are more things to know, the beta program is available for the US users only, and it is only available in English for the time being. In addition, YPN does not allow another contextual advertiser to advertise on the same page where their ads are displayed on, which would bar Google from pages they are advertising on, Google being the only one using contextual advertising. This problem is easy to solve, in case Web sites want to take advantage of what the two search engine giants are offering. It is possible to use different pages for both of them or using ad rotator software that are available on the Internet could solve the problem.

YPN also could enable Web sites to control what kind of ads are displayed on their sites giving them control on ads originating from their competitors and the YPN program has a built in mechanism to help block up to 200 such ads from users Web site. Also it is possible to choose particular categories of ads, which is not a new practice, and if strict regiment cannot be introduced, still the Web sites could have ads from the general catagory displayed on their Web site.

Even if it is not reinventing of the wheel, competition had been the main staple of the tech companies for a long time now. We hear a lot about who is copying who or who is putting an existing concept or way of doing things to a better use to generate money for a given company, like Google did, for example, with the pay-per-click program. Google recently went on to avail books in digital format, and both Yahoo and Microsoft jumped on the wagon, and very recently Amazon has also come up with its own version, simply because some of the new findings or usage are so lucrative to pass up, and if they do not take some measures it could affect their customer base.

At the end of the day, it is not only the big companies that are being benefited, the number includes the small players too who would not have had any other viable means of generating income from a Web site or a blog. While content producers can focus on the quality of their content, these programs will bring money to their doors, and the size of the amount of money to be made directly depends on the amount of hard work and effort put into the works.