The reason why delayed earning updates worry me

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   Mamertoposted 2 years ago

   I know that Hubpages is just collecting more accurate data. And that there are delays with the third party. But in a lot of cases, I get greatly reduced CPM when there is a delay in earning updates. I missed an opportunity when my hubs scored more than a thousand views last weekend. After a delay with the update, I only got a 1.29 dollar CPM. And it keeps on happening in the part days when delays occured. The CPM seems to go down when delays happened.

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      eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

      Does your CPM go up again when stats are updated? When there's a delay, it's because earnings aren't finalised. CPM is low because maybe earnings for low value ads are updated first. Then the high value ads increase the CPM later. We think that the CPM value is an average for the previous day.

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   2. STAFF

      Matt Wellsposted 2 years agoin reply to this

      Processing earnings data and CPM are in no way related in any way.

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   PaulGoodman67posted 2 years ago

   Eugene's right. The CPM is an auto-generated calculation based on the relationship between revenue and views/impressions. A low or otherwise inaccurate CPM figure can be generated when the figures are incomplete because CPM is essentially a ratio figure.
   
   While it's true that if CPMs are low over an extended time period, it can sometimes indicate lower overall (site-wide) ad revenue, the CPMs generated during pending periods are rarely useful as any sort of indicator IMHO.

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   Mamertoposted 2 years ago

   Thanks for the feedback, guys.

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   PaulGoodman67posted 2 years ago

   Why the Amazon figures have been delayed for so long is a mystery. My personal (non-HP) Amazon reports have been turning up daily as normal. There's been no changes to Amazon rates that I'm aware of that could explain it.
   
   Perhaps HP and Amazon are arguing about something...

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      eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

      I didn't even notice Amazon earnings were delayed. I don't earn much from Amazon anyway. I used to make sales everyday, but now it's maybe once a week. More than likely, many of the products I've added to articles are no longer available. I guess I should check and see what the story is.

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         PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

         I only earn a fraction of what I used to from Amazon nowadays, but I generally have at least one sale every day on at least one of my accounts. But there's been two days of reports of zero with the "not finalized" asterisk, then a bunch of pendings.
         
         It's very rare for me to not have any sales across all my accounts on one day, never mind two in a row. And this number of pendings hasn't happened for some time. The last time was when Amazon dropped its percentages early on in the pandemic.
         
         Something's going on, but I don't know what...

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            eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

            Do you check every so often to see whether products are still for sale?

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               PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

               Yes. I go through every article with Amazon links and I do it every few months. Anybody who uses Amazon should check multiple times each year IMHO.

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                  eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

                  I've been lax in that regard.

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                     PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

                     I have an awful feeling that laxness is common on here and that there are a lot of dud links to products that no longer exist. I'm probably more of an exception than a rule.
                     
                     It's in the writer's own interest to have links that work. A good Amazon link can have a lot of money-making potential. On the other hand, if the link has never made any money, then it probably shouldn't exist.
                     
                     All this is likely a factor in why HP snip sometimes. Then people complain.
                     
                     But still, I'm more concerned about what's happening between HP and Amazon right now. I don't expect Matt to tell us.
                     
                     What would be nice would be if HP could negotiate a better deal. At one point, they had better percentages than the regular users.

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            EricDockettposted 2 years agoin reply to this

            Same here. If HP is going to tell me I have had no sales on any of my accounts for several days, something is up.

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               PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

               For Amazon reports to pend for this long suggests that there's maybe some sort of financial negotiation going on, as happened during the pandemic over Amazon cutting its commission rates.
               
               If us writers are doing badly, as far as earnings go, HP must also be feeling the pinch.
               
               Amazon, as a corporation, has had disappointing sales recently and their share price is down 20%.
               
               Nobody's doing well right now, it seems.

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                  eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

                  Well let's hope Amazon pushes up its commission again if its feeling the pinch. There were two bonus commission periods this year that lasted a month. Also there was an opt in at the beginning of October where anyone who had an affiliate account could benefit from increased commission.

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                  EricDockettposted 2 years agoin reply to this

                  I don't know what's going on any more than anyone else. However, for a while, I have suspected that HP is moving more and more toward methods of earning that don't necessarily correlate with how good/bad the writers are doing.
                  
                  It used to be that the fortunes of the site and the writers rose and fell together, for the most part. It doesn't feel that way now.
                  
                  This, more than anything else, is what worries me about the future of this platform. Not so much that it will cease to operate, but that it is gradually becoming a place that is unwelcoming for serious writers.

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                     PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

                     I've not seen any real changes in the earning methods for years. Not in the way that you mean, anyway.
                     
                     The main way of earning money (Amazon) no longer works so well, but that's a different matter.
                     
                     I actually think that the opposite is happening regarding the future direction. Increasingly, they only want the "serious writers" and the old "community" element is being phased out. It may even be dead already, in some ways.
                     
                     Before Panda, it was truly an open platform. Nowadays, only a minority of writers get their work featured in the niches, which is where all the action is.
                     
                     In some ways, it's now an "open platform" in name only. As soon as a writer attempts to publish anything, they're being assessed for their worth. That job used to be Google's.
                     
                     As Google gets more strict, the natural reaction will be to continue to peel away more and more of the weaker members of the flock.
                     
                     To me it already feels more like a traditional publisher. Editors decide whether to feature your work. Editors alter work. Editors remove work.

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                        EricDockettposted 2 years agoin reply to this

                        There have been lots of changes.
                        
                        The "news" stories are a change in the earnings method for HP. These are hundreds if not thousands of thin pages added to the niche sites. We know what happens when you add bunches of thin pages to a site. But I can tell just from when a link to one of my articles is shared on one that they get a lot of eyeballs, and HP must earn a lot from them.
                        
                        So, who cares if they are dragging down the niche site itself? Which, maybe they are not. It just seems like, based on what we know about Panda and everything else that has happened in the past decade, there is a good chance they might.
                        
                        If the news writers would share actual articles more often on their stories it would lift up the writers as well. It is great when they do, but, more often than not, they just link to themselves.
                        
                        The alteration to the TOS regarding the 60/40 split is a change in earning methods. I am not yet ready to entertain the conspiracy theories, but it does not instill confidence.
                        
                        Removal of individual Adsense accounts is a change.
                        
                        As is removing the ability to use our own Amazon. There was once a benefit to using the HP Amazon program, but not anymore.
                        
                        HP tried adding Amazon sales pages to PetHelpful a few months ago. These pages stepped all over existing pages written by writers and, had they remained, would have cut writers out of any revenue they created.
                        
                        I consider myself a serious writer, though some may disagree. I want to write for a site that is on my side and considers me a partner. HubPages used to be that way.

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                           eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

                           You can add your own Amazon UK products of course and without sharing revenue with Hubpages, if articles are more relevant to a UK audience.

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                           DrMark1961posted 2 years agoin reply to this

                           Have you noticed Amazon ads popping up on your pages? I am wondering if there is a new deal between TAG and Amazon and that is why our Amazon earnings are "pending" for so long.

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                              PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

                              That's an interesting theory, Dr Mark.
                              
                              Something's going on with Amazon, maybe a negotiation over money, I don't know. The last time there was an extended pending period with Amazon, it appeared to be a dispute over them reducing their commission rates. We can only speculate as HP never told us what happened.
                              
                              Your theory sounds feasible, given that nothing has changed recently about Amazon's commission rates that I can see and my own (non-HP) Amazon reports are happening daily as normal.
                              
                              By way of context, those who follow the business news will know that there's been a post-COVID slump in Amazon sales and a large drop in their share price. Other online companies have seen problems, too. I think everybody's trying to scrape as much money as they can at the moment.

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                              1. STAFF

                                 Matt Wellsposted 2 years agoin reply to this

                                 There is a temporary delay with processing earnings data. We hope to have it finished by Tuesday.

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