We decided to study Google’s revenue models in depth, simply because Google has adopted certain revenue models that are different and haven’t been mentioned before, but are surely worth examining.
1. Google AdSense: AdSense allows website owners to run advertisements on their sites through Google. Google is like the intermediary between the advertiser and the website owner. The advertiser pays Google on a per-click or a per-thousand ads displayed basis. Google then pays the site owner a portion of this revenue and keeps some as its own revenue.
2.Google Answers: Google Answers was a research service that was previously offered by Google and was another way by which Google continued to make revenue. Instead of performing the search for information themselves, users would use Google Answers as a medium to find someone else to do their research for them. The user would ask a question, offer a certain price (ranging from $2 to $200) for the answer or the research, and the researchers would answer their questions. The researchers who did the research were not Google employees. After the question was answered, and the payment was made by the user, Google got to keep 25% of the payment, giving the researchers the remaining 75%.
Google Answers however, no longer accepts any new questions.
3. Google’s paid placement scheme for advertisers is called AdWords. AdWords generates more than 90% of Google’s total revenue, and its role in Google’s growth is very significant.
4. A new revenue model by Google. Google is talking about a new advertising program which pays website owners based on the pay-per-click model, but with a difference. It isn’t like AdSense, but is instead called Cost-per-action, and was first talked about in an email from Google AdSense to related website owners.
How does Cost-per-action differ from AdSense?
In CPA, the site owner does not get paid when the user only clicks on an ad (as is done with AdSense), but instead is paid when the visitor clicks on an ad and performs an action. For example, if the user clicks on an ad and makes a product purchase, only then is the site owner paid. In AdSense, the site owner gets paid by the advertiser just on a click of the ad by the user.
It seems that the CPA model has not been created to replace or compete with AdSense. Google emphasized that while AdSense will continue to be used, CPA will be used to appeal to different types of users.
