I implemented Chitika eMinimalls* approximately a month ago, and I was thrilled. Where I was battling relevancy issues with Adsense, I could specify keywords with Chitika to get products that baseball fans might appreciate. I used keywords like Detroit Tigers, Jeremy Bonderman, Pudge Rodriguez, and Detroit Red Wings. I had a nice selection of relevant products…until this weekend.
Suddenly many of those keywords dried up, including the very basic Detroit Tigers. Operating a Detroit blog, I tried all the local teams with no success. Not surprisingly, my clickthrough dried up as well. I don’t know if this is just a blip, but with Christmas season approaching I would expect more products to be advertised. When I implemented Chitika on this site I had a hard time finding related products also.
Now nothing says that you have to offer products related to your site content, but it is probably a pretty safe bet that it improves clickthrough rates. From a personal perspective, if I’m going to subject my readers to advertising I want to at least attempt and make it relevant. I’m not saying that’s right or wrong, that’s just my viewpoint.
While there is still alot to like about the Chitika system, and it continues to perform well on my other sites, the lack of related products might not make it a great bet for sports sites. I’m not giving up on it yet because of my early success, but it is something that I’ll watch closely for the next week or so.
*This is an affiliate link, where if you sign up for the service I receive 10% of what you earn (it doesn’t effect your earnings at all).
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