What is wrong with the so called “arbitrage”? $4,000/month denied

[MdeA]

I have a site that I advertised using AdWords and made a profit (around $4,000/month) using AdSense. I did that for around 5 months until Google told me I couldn’t advertise that site anymore using AdWords because of arbitrage.

I thought it was a win/win/win situation because users got what they were looking for, I showed that to Google using some stats (bounce rate, pages/visit) that they for sure knew already and other stats (from AddThis) that maybe they didn’t know. I made a good profit and Google made a lot more than me from my AdWords budget and the share they take from AdSense.

First question: Is that “arbitrage” rule something else than picking favorites and shutting down whoever they decide for whatever reason they decide?

It’s been two months and I haven’t been able to find something to replace AdWords as with them I was paying an average 0.03 CPC and got thousands of visitors daily.

Second question: What would you do or where would you go to buy targeted traffic again at a cost that could yield a positive ROI. Is there anything wrong with that?

Third question: Do other CPC networks also have such “arbitrage” rules in place?

PS: I didn’t get any notification from AdSense, but because I use them in other web properties I have and I didn’t want to get in trouble with them I replaced them on this site by ads from other network.

[guzpra]

I heard term "Arbitrage" is like having a large group of affiliate marketers and click each other ads or transact the way so they can have a lot of commissions, and thats really popular a few years ago.

and maybe google detects some frauds for your clicking ads IP or something, I don't really know

[timpears]

AdWords/AdSense have specific rules about not using this method to make money. They instituted it a few years ago.

7search.com doesn't have such a rule I understand. You will not get as much traffic as from Google, but this method will work with them. Google take a dim view of buying traffic and sending them to your AdSense pages though. But if you buy the traffic to a page without AdSense on it, and then have a strong enticement to the real information you were advertising, a large percentage of people should click through. On this page you would have AdSense and it is likely that a decent amount of clicks could be generated.

[paulgl]

You made the mistake by not following the rules.

Contrary to popular belief, you can have adsense on a site, and
spin that in adwords.

That's why adsense users continually get a free adwords coupon
from google begging them to do so.

But they don't like what is affectionately know as "arbitrage."

They define that as having a site that exists for no other reason,
and has no monetization, except for putting adsense on it.

You could have thought outside the box, come up with another
site that offered something as the main thing, and tossed
adsense on it, put it in adwords.

In fact, it sounds as if you can do that now.

But slapping adsense on a site and spinning that, only for
an adsense click, is NOT a win-win situation for google.
It makes them look bad. They want ads that take people
to what they want. Not be bombarded with more ads.

Paul

[MdeA]

Originally Posted by timpears

AdWords/AdSense have specific rules about not using this method to make money. They instituted it a few years ago.

7search.com doesn't have such a rule I understand. You will not get as much traffic as from Google, but this method will work with them. Google take a dim view of buying traffic and sending them to your AdSense pages though. But if you buy the traffic to a page without AdSense on it, and then have a strong enticement to the real information you were advertising, a large percentage of people should click through. On this page you would have AdSense and it is likely that a decent amount of clicks could be generated.

7search is one of the alternatives I looked at, but finally didn't try them, maybe I should give it another look. I'm now trying Microsoft AdCenter and Infolinks, but I get very little traffic.
About, having no ads on the landing page I asked Google if that would make them happy and they said that I would have to remove all ads from the whole site in order to be complaint. Does that make any sense? Mind that, even with all the ads there, the vast majority of users who landed on my site got what they were looking for, and I showed that to Google using the stats.

[owenlee]

If google say no means no..you are lucky that they inform you

[MdeA]

Originally Posted by paulgl

You made the mistake by not following the rules.

Contrary to popular belief, you can have adsense on a site, and
spin that in adwords.

That's why adsense users continually get a free adwords coupon
from google begging them to do so.

But they don't like what is affectionately know as "arbitrage."

They define that as having a site that exists for no other reason,
and has no monetization, except for putting adsense on it.

You could have thought outside the box, come up with another
site that offered something as the main thing, and tossed
adsense on it, put it in adwords.

In fact, it sounds as if you can do that now.

But slapping adsense on a site and spinning that, only for
an adsense click, is NOT a win-win situation for google.
It makes them look bad. They want ads that take people
to what they want. Not be bombarded with more ads.

Paul

Thanks for your input Paul.
I had AdSense in every page, including the landing page, but users who came from AdWords (95% percent of the traffic) didn't leave the site upon arriving. Instead, they filled in a two-fields form, submitted it, and got what they were looking for.
My bounce rate was 30% and 25% in the US. The average pages per visit was ~3. The shares using AddThis showed very high number of Prints. All that told me that my ads on AdWords took people to what they wanted.

On the other hand, my top competitor in AdWords (or one of them) is still there (big company, of course). When people click on their ads they get a page with AdSense at the very top and also at the bottom while the rest are links (SERPs) to other websites. They don't sell anything to this users. Does that sound like arbitrage to you? Kind of a pliable concept, isn't it?

I would bet that most users searching for those keywords would rather go to my site that theirs. As a matter of fact, they were one of my top referrers from my AdWords ads

Not that I mind what kind of business they have with Google, but don't tell me that my site and AdWords ads made them look bad. I have stats to argue that and in any case there are others making them look even worse and they don't seem to care.

I understand there's not much I can do about it, so back to my question:
Do you know of another PPC network with good targeting for volume traffic and affordable bidding?
Thanks, again.

[MdeA]

Originally Posted by owenlee

If google say no means no..you are lucky that they inform you

I get that, that's why I'm looking for an alternative. However, I can't help but to feel fouled.