A reader asked me yesterday to comment on a ProBlogger guest post that asserts that AdSense publishers can get higher click values by posting to their blogs earlier in the day. In this context “earlier” refers to the early morning hours — the writer being in the Eastern (GMT-5) time zone. The idea posting time is therefore sometime between midnight and 6 am.

Is it true that click values are higher in that time period? Maybe. Let's look at the variables involved:

• AdWords advertisers (remember, all the money comes from AdWords) set a daily budget for their ad campaigns.
• The AdWords “day” defaults to Pacific time (GMT-8).
• The AdSense “day” is also Pacific time.
• AdWords advertisers can optionally set their day to be
  their own time zone.
• Ad campaigns can be spread evenly across the entire AdWords “day” (the default) or else accelerated so that ads are shown as quickly as possible.
• Ad campaigns can be limited to specific time periods.
• Ad campaigns can be limited to specific regions by geography and/or language.
• Ad campaigns can specifically target either the search network (Google's search pages) or the content network (AdSense) or both and pay different prices for each.

As you can see, there are quite a few variables involved. Because of this, I don't think there's one answer that applies to everyone. Ultimately, your blog's earnings are based on the traffic to your site and when your readers typically read your postings. If your readers are mostly in EST, for example, then posting early in the “AdSense day” means you'll catch the readers who start their day with their favorite blogs. If the advertisers in your niche target the EST crowd, then yes, there would be more ads available overall early in the morning. I can see that happening.

But it all depends on the blog. This one you're reading right now gets a lot of clicks late in the AdSense day.

In other words, you need to do some experiments to see if there's an optimal time to post your blog entries. Try posting at a specific time for a week or two and see if makes a difference. Then try posting at a different time and see what happens then. I don't think there's a one-size-fits-all answer for this one.

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Eric Giguere wrote Make Easy Money with Google, which is not the spammy get-rich book you might think it is, and is about to release (finally) Uncommon AdSense, a book aimed at more experienced AdSense publishers. And no, it won't be overpriced.

Every once in a while, someone in the world of Internet Marketing comes out with something fairly original. One of my readers has just launched a board game about Internet Marketing called, er, The Internet Marketing Board Game. Yes, it's a physical product that they ship to you, not a downloadable digital product — otherwise I wouldn't be mentioning it here. It's certainly the first such board game I've heard about.

The makers of this game are promoting it as a fun educational tool whose primary goal is to teach the players all the ins and outs of Internet marketing. The learning starts immediately: whip out your credit card to order the game and you'll learn your first lesson about Internet marketing, that Internet-only products tend to sell for a lot more than what you'd pay for at your local department/discount store. (This one has an introductory price of $247.)

Yes, AdSense is covered. So are private label products, affiliate marketing, autoresponders, etc. It might be a fun way to teach your friends and family what it is you do exactly, since they probably think you're not doing anything important, just sitting at your computer all the time, wasting your time…

I wonder if the game would qualify as a training-related tax deduction? Let me know if you try it (either the game or the tax deductibility).

Better hurry if you want it for Christmas, though. While you can be up on ClickBank buying gifts on Christmas eve (note that I don't recommend you do that unless you're truly desperate… it's certainly not the kind of gift my spouse would want), something like a board game has to be shipped to your house and we all know how much time that can take.

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Next up: an AdSense question from one of my readers…

Eric Giguere wrote Make Easy Money with Google, which is not the spammy get-rich book you might think it is, and is about to release (finally) Uncommon AdSense, a book aimed at more experienced AdSense publishers. And no, it won't be overpriced.

Hey, since GrayWolf is doing it, I thought I'd join in the fray… Actually, I'm not begging. But if you're on LinkedIn and want to link to me, here's the profile for that Eric Giguere fellow whose name you can never pronounce and just drop me a mail at any of my email addresses (yeah, I'll make you work for it… hint: look at the bottom of the page) and I'll happy to send you an invitation if you seem legit. (No recruiters, please, there's just no point.)

Part of me, though, thinks that LinkedIn is nothing more than the online equivalent of a male instrument size comparison contest. (See point above about recruiters.) There, I said it.

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Eric Giguere wrote Make Easy Money with Google, which is not the spammy get-rich book you might think it is, and is about to release (finally) Uncommon AdSense, a book aimed at more experienced AdSense publishers. And no, it won't be overpriced.