What to expect
Google doesn't disclose what niche is better or what click through rate is on average. You need to test your own. There is very little averages with Google Adsense. Typically the average click through rate (CTR) is low. 10% is high.
Are you going to make money now!?
Probably not. Don't expect to start a website or blog and put a handful of content on it and expect to be able to sit back and start making hundreds of dollars right away. Sure you can get a click here and there but until you start building a site that gets more than 200 visitors a day you will not start earning anywhere near what you would think.
All good things take time and if you are trying to make hundreds or even thousands of dollars We have a few things you need. Are there a few people out there that made it quick? Sure, there's always the exceptions, but plan for the long term and if your site explodes then be grateful.
What makes my site get more clicks?
Content, content, content!!! We're not talking about you copying other peoples content, we're talking about you creating your own niche, new content. People follow you with your views and not copying others. Writing random events or talking about personal experiences in your life you will find with the average person they don't care. The only people that wants to know about your dog and your vacation or your new socks you got for Christmas are your family and friend. That's what Facebook and Twitter is for.
What do I do then?
What you need to do is develop a product or a topic that will be interesting. Maybe you're making a blog following a movie star's career. Maybe it's about sports or fashion. things that you can learn with and grow with and add content to your site/blog every day, month, year, and 10 years. It needs to be unique where visitors will search for your site.
100 pages of basic content will lose to 20 pages of planned and unique content. Massive blogging isn't the answer. If it's not unique then it's not going to pull the traffic you want. If you could forget about the clicks and money you want to make from your ads and focus on your content and web design (flow) then you will do better than 95% of the websites out there. Ask yourself a couple of questions each time your make a video or write a new article. Is this quality content? Would I watch/read this? Is it better than the others posted online?
I know, this topic could be an entire book -- Chime in and let us know what you've found to work.
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By Mark Flockhart: The best compliment you can give me is visit or join my network for designers LTCW
Comments
Make sure you have a good analytics program so you can see where your traffic is coming from, where they go on your site, how long they stay and who is clicking on your ads.
I have found that the smallest changes in design can make a big difference in whether or not people will enter my site, become members, participate and click on ads. Test changes to see how they make a difference. Keep testing until you are happy with the results.
Sometimes you will find that all changes in design, content, ad formats yield no ad clicks. This usually means you are in a niche that doesn't lend itself to ad clicks. Are your potential visitors shopping for something? Are there advertisers willing to pay good money to reach your traffic?
Lots of factors to consider and test.
Good luck!