Niche website, does responsive design matter to you?

There are a lot of people who use their phones to surf the internet nowadays.

Besides, responsive design does not refers only to mobile devices, but also to tablets which are also of various sizes.

So, you will lose valuable traffic from both mobile phones and tablets, with a non responsive site.

I haven't used Adsense for a long time, but far as I know the Adsense ads are not responsive and of course will break a responsive layout in some cases.
Yet, it seems to me that Adsense developed a specific ad type which is responsive (I can be wrong, I have not recently visited my Adsense account ).

I would avoid AdSense. Honestly. There are ways to generate a very high income with AdSense, but in my personal experience it boils down to this:

1. High-Paying Keywords
2. Volume Sites.
3. Volume, Targeted Traffic.

You'd be much better off monetizing with affiliate offers and, simultaneously, growing a list.

Tom

Not to speak for Tom, but he didn't mention anything about informational products. There are plenty of businesses (mine included) doing very well at affiliate marketing without pitching a single informational product. If the site's about photography Amazon is a good bet as are B&H Photo and Adorama. There are others you should also check out, but those seem to be the big three when it comes to photography.

That said, there's nothing to preclude you from putting a couple of Adsense ads on your site as well, though my guess is that Tom's right and you'll make a lot more using other monetization methods. I mix an occasional Adsense add in on my site and even on good months Adsense still comprises less than 3% of my site revenue (though it should be noted that I have purposely not optimized Adsense when it comes to placement, ad types, ad categories, etc.).

Still, don't change your plans just because a couple of strangers gave you some advice. Research it, think about it, try something, evaluate it, then go back and research and think about it some more.

As to your original question, I'll just add my voice to the chorus that says "responsive" is an absolute must. In fact, I can't think of a single business case as to why you wouldn't want a responsive site.

That's not the case, unfortunately, Google announced the big change long before they implemented everything, and they actually make responsive websites a priority now. So, new website or old, everyone needs to adapt!