Whenever I see a news story about Google's development plans, I usually give it a read, make sure it's not going to affect my AdSense earnings... and daydream for a minute or two about running a multi-billion dollar business.
Google's recent spat with eBay though caught my attention. It was one of those rare times when Google's news could actually affect my income.
In case you missed it, Google scheduled a party to promote its Checkout service so that it would compete with a conference organized by eBay, which owns Paypal. eBay wasn't amused... and announced an indefinite halt to its Google advertising campaign.
As eBay is by far Google's biggest advertiser, that matters. If you've been earning from eBay ads in your AdSense units, you aren't earning from them any more.
The analysts dragged into the various news channels are all saying that the spat will be over soon though -- Google won't want to lose the advertising revenue and eBay won't want to lose the traffic. In the meantime, the loss of such a big advertiser is likely to drag prices down across the network. I know I'll be checking my stats very carefully as long as eBay isn't advertising to see if their argument has reduced the cost of my clicks.
But it does raise a question though. eBay has its own affiliate program (and I'm experimenting with a new service that lets you put eBay ads in AdSense-style units -- I'll let you know how it goes shortly) so is it worth promoting auctions in your AdSense units at all? You could throw in an affiliate ad for the same product, let your AdSense ads show something else and increase the range of your advertising.
When Google and eBay have kissed and made up, it might be something worth checking out.
It's Del.icio.us!
Furl It!
