Hi, welcome to DaniWeb. There are two different ways to sell advertising. When advertising is sold on a CPM basis, that is cost per thousand impressions, and there is a fixed rate for every 1,000 impressions. When advertising is sold on a CPC basis, that is cost per click, and money is made only when ads are clicked on. Google AdSense follows the CPC model. There are other ad networks and ad agencies such as Tribal Fusion, ValueClick, Burst!Media, etc. which operate on the CPM model.
cscgal
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Yes, regardless of the number of impressions, you only get paid when someone clicks on an AdSense ad.
You CAN run AdSense side by side with other advertisements. You simply can't run it on the same page at the same time as other "contextual ads" which basically means any direct competitor type ads, such as Yahoo's Publisher Network, which is basically the exact same thing as AdSense but by Yahoo instead of Google.
cscgal
The Queen of DaniWeb
19,421 posts since Feb 2002
Reputation Points: 1,474
Solved Threads: 229