AdSense Backup Ads Using Amazon Affiliate and Commission Junction

When AdSense does not have advertisers to fill your ad slot it displays a blank space by default which doesn't exactly maximize your revenue potential. A better solution is to display alternate ads. In this post I'll show you how to easily set up your AdSense Backup Ads to display either Commission Junction Smart Zones or Amazon Affiliate ads.



Both Amazon and Commission Junction run large, well respected affiliate programs that can help you earn money from space that would otherwise be left blank. The process is very simple and you only need to know some basic HTML and CSS as well as have the ability to upload files to your website.

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Why I Don't Use StatCounter To Track AdSense Clicks

A lot of people have been using services like StatCounter to track AdSense clicks as well as for gathering other information about their website visitors.

StatCounter is the most popular free service that offers the ability to track AdSense, Amazon and other affiliate ad clicks but I don't mean to single them out. I think it's a bad idea in general to give access to information about your site's visitors and what AdSense, Amazon or other affiliate ads your visitors click on. It is something that could potentially reduce your earnings.

Not many things in life are free and it's hard to imagine a company is giving you access to their service and not getting anything out of it. They have servers and bandwidth to pay for as well as salaries for their staff.

StatCounter claims that they make their revenue through advertisements on their website, they do not put ads on your site and you can even have their tracker hidden so it's not visible on your website. But is StatCounter getting more out of the deal?

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Inline Contextual Text Popup Ads with Amazon and Blogger

Google has been making a lot of improvements to their free blogging platform, Blogger.com.

One of these recent changes has been the integration of Blogger with the Amazon Affiliate program.



Now you can easily link your blog with your Amazon Associates tracking id. One of the benefits is you can quickly and easily add affiliate links to products on Amazon.com by using the Amazon Product Finder that is located next to your post editor.

Just type search for the product you want and click to insert a text, image or advanced link+image link which includes pricing information.



This is a lot faster than logging into Amazon's affiliate site, searching for the product, choosing the appropriate tracking id, setting the options to match your site's template then copying and pasting the code. It's even better if you usually add plain image links. In the past you had to download the image and then upload it to blogger. Not anymore!





You can also use your Amazon Associates account and blogger to include contextual inline text pop up ads in your blog posts. When your guest hovers over a link a small pop-up will appear showing the details of the product. Here's how to do it.

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