AdSense Arbitrage and Single Page Sites

I posted before about my first single page ’site’ on Halogen Desk Lamps.  I’ve had a bit of success, so far, with it.  It’s indexed in Google, and while it’s not all that high in the SERPs, it’s usually within the first page for “Halogen Desk Lamps” and “Full Spectrum Desk Lamps”.  I’m converting around 2/3 of my visitors on average.  Some days I convert 100%, and some I convert only about 25%.  It just depends
on the day.

Recently, I had a spare $18 in my paypal account, so I decided to engage in a little adsense arbitrage.  Essentially, that is where you check your average CPC (on the low end of the scale) for your main keywords, and create adwords ads, bidding less than the average CPC on the site.  For example:

Let’s say that I’m using the keywords “foo” and “bar”.  “Foo”, in the lower amounts, has an average CPC of around thirty cents ($0.30).  “Bar” has an average CPC of around twenty-five cents ($0.25).  In this case, I would create an adwords campaign with those two keywords, and set my maximum CPC bid for each keyword to be less than $0.25.  I’d likely go with $0.20 at the very most, and more than likely around $0.15 or so.

So I’ve had an ad running for a while, for that page.  The ad reads as follows (Remember, ad format is TITLE // Line 1 // Line 2 // URL):

Halogen Desk Lamps
Learn More About Halogen Desk Lamps
and Find Great Buys From Top Stores
fyreplace.com/HalogenDeskLamps

Yes, I’m well aware that it’s a crappy ad.  Needless to say, it’s shown nearly 50 times, so far, and hasn’t gotten a single click.  I’ve gone through and made changes to my account, however, to increase the number of ads shown.  First, I enabled the Google Budget Optimizer, which will automatically change the CPC max bid for each keyword, to maximize displays and minimize costs.  Secondly, I created a new ad:

Save Your Eyes
Reduce Eye Strain With Halogen
and Full Spectrum Desk Lamps!
HalogenDeskLamps

It should be fairly obvious why this ad is better.  Here are a few reasons:

• The “title” is catchier.
• The ad includes a “call to action” (in this case, saving your eyes)
• The ad includes a reinforcement of the call to action (in this case, another call in the form of reducing eye strain)
• The ad includes both halogen and full spectrum lamps
• The ad URL isn’t a /whatever style URL.  Although it’s not a .com, or even a complete URL, most people will assume that it’s a .com, or similar.

The thing to remember is:  The majority of people, once on your page, WILL click through to an advertisement, thus making you money.  So long as you make more than you have to spend to get them there, you’re golden.

I’ll be updating more, as time goes by.  If this works out reasonably well, I’ll be opening a few more pages, and running some ads on them.  I’m actually considering doing an investment project with some folks I know, where we buy a generic info-related .com (or .org) domain, create a ton of single-page (or few-page) sites on it, do a directory style front page, and split the costs of adwords ads for the pages (as well as split the profit).

Before I go, here are a few quick tips for your own single-page sites:

• Do your keyword research! (There’s not much point in using keywords that only get around five cents/click, when you usually can’t bid much lower than that in your ads.)
• Try to find topics/keywords that aren’t already watered down with similar single-page site.
• Got the love of all that is holy, do not use articles from article directories.  Most of the time, since these articles are being used so often online, Google (and other engines) will ignore them, and won’t index your page.  Also, if you use an article from those sites, you have to include a link to the author’s URL, which gives you viewers a place to click that ISN’T an ad.  That’s bad.  It’s okay to base your own articles off of others’ articles, but do not plagerize.
  period.
• Use a decent template for your sites.  Yes, they can all look the same if you want them to, just use different images.
• Do not - I repeat, DO NOT - place too many ad units on the freaking page!  One link unit, one large Google unit (medium or large rectangle), and one skyscraper (standard, or wide), should be sufficient.
• You might consider Chitika, if you’re doing single-page consumer-product-oriented sites.
• Do NOT spend money on ads you can’t afford to lose, especially when you first start out.  Arbitrage is a lot like gambling.  You’re gambling that you’ll make more money than you’re shelling out.

All right, that’s it for now.  I’ll keep you updated with how things are working out.

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