Should You Show Ads on Your Website?

If you get decent traffic to your website, you may want to show ads on your website. It’s an easy extra income stream, and it’s quick to set up.

But there are some drawbacks as there are with other things in your business. Read on to learn about the good and the bad of showing ads on your site.

But first, this post contains affiliate links. Read my full disclosure policy to learn more.

Why Show Ads on Your Website

After struggling with the decision for a while, I chose to show ads on my websites. Here are some of the best parts of this choice.

Earn Passive Income

When it comes to making money online, ads are the closest you’ll get to true passive income. Everything else, from downloads to courses and even affiliate marketing, require some sort of maintenance.

As long as your website gets traffic, you can earn money from ad impressions and clicks. It doesn’t matter if you have super new content or if all of your posts are months or years old.

And if you do publish new content, you’re just giving yourself even more chances to make money later on. Every new blog post or page can act as a sort of salesperson to increase your ad revenue.

Increase Your Earning Potential

Showing ads on your website can increase your earning potential in a few ways. For one, they’re passive once you set them up.

All you have to do is get people to your website, and it’s an advertiser’s job to get people to click. You can then spend the majority of your time focusing on other revenue streams.

Second, as you create more content, you can increase your earning potential even more. Maybe you only have 10 blog posts published.

Once you publish 100 posts, you may be able to earn 10 times the amount you would with only 10 posts.

Ads Are All But Expected

The thing that made me feel more okay about showing ads was that readers all but expect them. Visit almost any major blog or news site, and you’ll see ads.

So it’s not going to be as much of a shock as you might think it is for your visitors to see ads. Now, that doesn’t mean a site without ads isn’t professional or anything.

However, don’t let your mindset stop you from giving ads a try. You can always stop running them if you find they hurt your website or business.

Why Not Show Ads on Your Website

Of course, showing ads on your website isn’t perfect. Consider a few of the drawbacks before you apply to an ad program or agency.

Takes Visitors Away

One of the biggest downsides of showing ads is they take visitors away from your site. Someone sees an ad for a product, and they go to the merchant’s website.

If you’re lucky, they’ll come back after they buy something. But they may get distracted and not go back to what they were doing on your site.

For businesses that sell products or services on their websites, this isn’t good. Whether you offer private lessons or sell your own products, you may not want to drive people away.

Can Be Distracting

Another con of showing ads on your website is that they can look distracting. If you want people to really enjoy your content, ads can take away from that.

Even if you don’t get any ad clicks, it still may not look that good. Some ads are especially distracting, and I know I’ve left websites more than once due to intrusive, annoying ads.

So if you want to use ads, make sure they’re not going to be overwhelming. Luckily, most ad networks let you decide where you want to show ads or not.

No Control Over the Content

You should also consider that you have no control over the ads that will show up on your site. In most cases, they’ll be based on the visitor’s activity online.

That means ads could easily lead visitors to your competitors or to totally irrelevant websites. You may be able to block certain advertisers from appearing on your site.

But you can’t always predict when an advertiser is going to show up. So there may be new advertisers all the time, and you can’t avoid these issues all of the time.

Can You Show Ads on Some Pages?

Perhaps you sell your own products or services, but you want to give ads a try. You can show ads on your website on some pages but not others.

At least with Google AdSense, you can easily opt-out certain pages in your AdSense account. So whenever you add a new product, you can adjust the settings so that ads don’t get in the way.

Final Thoughts

If you want to make some extra cash, you may want to show ads on your website. Be sure to consider the pros and cons to decide whether it’s worth it for you.

And if you’re looking to start a website that will get the traffic you need for ads to pay off, learn how to start a blog!