When talking advertisements, most website owners fall into a couple of groups. They either think that young websites should not have ads at all–lest it scare away potential early visitor. Or they assume that early ads are a good way to get people used to the idea that this page will, inevitably, have ads.

I fall into the latter category.

So when is the best time to add ads to your site? As soon as possible. But remember–if your website is young and fresh (like this one), you’ll find that your ads won’t get many (if any) clicks for some time to come. Programs like Google’s AdSense need tons of traffic in order to get popular while affiliate programs are luck of the draw. In other words, you need lots of views to make money through AdSense but quality, focused traffic to make money via affiliate programs–like the ones you see in the right column.

Start small when you add ads to your site. Don’t go hog wild with thousands of different products right from the get go. Tempting as it may be to try and get people to click your links, don’t overwhelm your visitors like some internet marketers tend to do. You want to get your viewers used to the idea of having ads on a website–not drive them away with sensory overload.

So slap a few AdSense blocks in your posts. Throw a handful of 125×125 pixel squares on your sidebar. And keep on posting to get your view and subscriber counts up. Then watch the money flow in.

When do you think is the best time to put ads up? Am I totally wrong in believing that the sooner you do it–the better?

I always get a kick seeing how much some people valuate their blogs at. Basing their estimates on data from some fly-by-night site that seems to calculate data by pulling it from a part of their body where the sun doesn’t shine, these people generally get their numbers wrong.

What was that? You have 50 subscribers, 300 posts, and an Alexa ranking of 400,000? And your blog’s worth $15,000 USD? Riiiiight.

Of course, correcting someone on how much their blog is worth is definitely bad form. I’m more than willing to let people live their fantasies and assume that their site could be sold for thousands at the tip of a hat. But I found a post the other day that I may just present to people who enjoy going around spouting out how much their blog is worth.

It’s right over here, at Pajama Professional. A fun little post that discusses the discrepancies between a number of the multitudes of blog valuation engines.

According to the post, Sara’s blog ranges from $331 to a whopping $16,074 and everything else in between. That’s a pretty wide span.

So what is the lesson we can all learn from this? That blog valuation calculators are utter garbage. They’re good for nothing more than a laugh. After all, the real amount your blog is worth is whatever someone is willing to pay for it when you decide to put it up for sale. For some people, it’s the cost of a domain name. For others, it’s well into the millions.

Oh, and if you’re wondering what these sites think my blog is worth? Have a look.

Website Outlook: $1306.70
CubeStat: $575.97
CyberWyre: $125
SmartPageRank: $103
dnScoop: $21