Potential Pitfalls Of Adsense Arbitrage

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I’ve never done Google Adsense Arbitrage, so I’ll disclose that information right up front. The main reason I never did is because I’ve almost always had a decent amount of organic search traffic. For that reason the subject never interested me too much. Lately I’ve been seeing Adsense Arbitrage being touted as a “get rich quick” or “make money fast” scheme for people who are impatient about earning big bucks on the internet.

It’s easy to understand why Adsense Arbitrage would appeal to newbies. They don’t have to have any specials skills at all, and in fact are encouraged to build the ugliest possible websites (websites with NO navigation) in order to garner the highest CTR. But for someone who’s been building websites for years, the advantages aren’t as clear, and in fact some glaring disadvantages stand out. I’ll discuss them here.

1) Adsense arbitrage would screw up my cash flow. Google pays you a full month later. On October 1st, the clicks you earn in Adsense will be paid out on roughly 11/27. That means your cash flow can be tied up for 7 weeks, and your credit card bills come within 4.

2) The websites themselves ARE NOT WANTED by Google. That’s right, Google does not want arbitrage websites and they’re going out of their way to make it clear. Why buck the trend?

3) Arbitrage websites are useless to the end user. They really cannot be justified from a usability standpoint. The only reason to build such a website is to make cash for yourself. (If you do)

4) Arbitrage is still a lot of work, with no long term equity build. If you add pages to a content-rich website every day, you can expect to be paid for those efforts when you sell the website. Despite the fact you still have to work every day hard at Arbitrage, you won’t have anything to sell to another person. The site doesn’t have any visitors or content of its’ own.

Those are my main problems, and the reason I never decided to do it. I’m sure there are successful practioners of the trade, but they probably work just as hard as anyone else, and are on thinner ice than most. Google has raised minimum bids in Adwords and introduced a Quality Bot to find the sites. The bell just may be tolling for all but the most profitable arbitrageurs soon.

I think Adsense Arbitrage has hit the point where there is no more money for the original pioneers. They’re out of the game, and now selling their “secret tools” to the stooges who are late to the game and looking for easy money.

What are your experiences with Adsense Arbitrage?

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