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I do the Google Ads on some of my pages to pay the website bills and to fund some renewable energy projects. It turns out to be a very painless way to offset expenses and make some extra money for projects.
For those not familiar with the Google Ads, the site owner just allows some space on pages that he or she wants the ads to appear on, and Google finds advertisers whose material matches the content of the page. In this way the ads usually have some relevance to the material on the page.
The owner of the site has little to nothing to say about whose ads are used. Google basically selects the highest bidder for the kind of material on the page, and plops their ad in. If someone clicks on an ad, the advertisers pays a few cents. Google keeps part of this, and sends the rest on to the site owner.
So, the products advertised are not ones I've evaluated and selected. In many cases I've never heard of the products at all until I see the ads. I don't endorse any of the products -- in most cases I really don't know any more about them than you do. To me, this is one of the best features of the Google Ads program -- I can make some money on the ads without having to evaluate and select products myself, and without incurring any potential conflict of interest by favoring products because I take advertising from them.
In many cases I find the ads helpful, in that they point to products and services that relate to the material on the page. I hate to admit it, but sometimes they are more helpful than the actual material on the page :) On the other hand, some of the ads seem like out-and-out scams to me, and I would not touch them with a 10 ft pole.
So, follow up on the ads if they are of interest, but please beware!
Gary August 16, 2008