Ugly Sites Earn More With Google AdSense?

Yesterday, I posted a thread at our forums named Do Ugly Sites Earn More With AdSense? I wrote about a recent popular article named The Surprising Truth About Ugly Websites. The article discusses how a site named Plenty of Fish, an ugly dating site, made over $10,000 from AdSense in one day. The logic as to why Plenty of Fish and other ugly sites (i.e. Craigs List and IMDB) make money, is because they are extremely functional, the author states. But, in my opinion, these sites are not all that functional.

Maybe Craigs List is a bad example, but consider the site that reportedly made $10,000 in one day from AdSense. Plenty of Fish is not functional, not easy to use and, in my humble opinion, hard to look at. The reason why it made so much money with AdSense is because it drives search traffic organically, people land on the site, and immediately want to click off. They find the nearest ad, and most attractive part of the page, which happens to be the AdSense ad, and clicks off. Phew, they are saved and they move on to a real dating site, that is both professional looking and functional.

Forum discussion on this topic at Search Engine Roundtable Forums.

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posted rustybrick in Google AdSense at March 21, 2006 9:49 AM Comments (23)

Comments

i think it made 10,000 in one day, not in a month, as you posted.

Posted by comments at March 21, 2006 10:28

Yes, sorry about that, it was a typo.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at March 21, 2006 10:42

The site probably gets a lot of traffic because it's free? Maybe these people don't care if it's hard to use a site, as long as they get something in return for free.

Posted by Nadir at March 21, 2006 15:00

Hey Barry,
Maybe this means RustyBrick should change its business plan and make lousy dating affiliate sites instead of custom e-commerce sites. If you could make me a site that made 10,000 in a day, I'd write you a nice fat check.

Posted by Jaimie Sirovich at March 21, 2006 15:03

I think your confusing making money with adsense and getting conversions. I'm not saying ugly sites don't sell. I am saying that pleny of fish makes money off of PPC. That is all we know. We don't know if the click turn into sales. Getting people to click on adsense is very differnt than getting actual conversions.

Posted by ogletree at March 21, 2006 16:34

Why would an individual care if he's getting actual conversions or just getting PPC money?

This is the same reason I don't use SiteMatch ads, but the difference is not material if they both fill your wallet.

TBH, if ugly sites get good ad "conversions" people will make them.

Again, why I don't do this kind of advertising.

Posted by Jaimie Sirovich at March 21, 2006 18:29

If you believe that you can get 14 million pageviews a day from being in search results I have a bridge to sell you.

Posted by comment at March 22, 2006 15:50

LOL. I set up an adSense account today. Hope I'll get money, but for other reasons ;)

Posted by Napolux at March 27, 2006 10:07

It seems that Plenty Of Fish read the article.
They have cleaned up the site a lot.

Posted by RegDCP at March 30, 2006 20:18

How does Google Adsense pays money? What's the calculation of their payment? I am using the google adsense for 2 months over now but the payment method is still unknown to me?

Posted by Satyajit at June 26, 2006 06:43

I have copule of websites and having about %45 click through ratio don't have much traffic though :) My websites definitely not ugly.

Posted by No Name at August 20, 2006 18:02

Its because they have high PR and because of that they have lot of movement in there site

Posted by שש בש at August 31, 2006 02:37

One newsletter site was getting more new members with a plain sign up form then a cool looking one. (newsletter was about making money on the web - on how important a newsletter is for a site and stuff like that)

Posted by Joost at June 7, 2007 10:21

yea thats what it it,because people come to ugly sites with SE traffic and when they see more good ads then they move to another by clicking adsense ads. and ugly get paid more.

Posted by 010081 at September 1, 2007 07:47

colopotay is right thats how they do what they do

Posted by Juli at February 14, 2008 18:06

good thinking..

My site is not listed on google.. but i'm still getting decent $$ (15 a day) its just from affliates.

Posted by Jake at March 31, 2008 01:02

Yes, I think you are right, ugly site works well and they are making tons of money. POF is making in 2 days what i make in a whole year..

Posted by Tom Lee at June 24, 2008 09:15

Yes Really a good content, but i think it is not correct that ugly sites earn money, when we are creating content rich sites then only it is possible to create money

Posted by Shaikh Izaj Ahmed at October 10, 2008 06:12

Its a myth that people click on relevant ads when google atches them keyword to keyword.

Most people click ads when they are leisure, not really looking for anything, just surfing.

Dating sites like plenty off fish attract people who are at leisure and since they do not have any real purpose of being there they dont mind clicking and surfing.

Posted by A at November 1, 2008 12:13

I'm not saying ugly sites don't sell. I am saying that pleny of fish makes money off of PPC. That is all we know. We don't know if the click turn into sales.

Posted by Kim at March 17, 2009 19:40

I will build a female beauty website with poor design and a frugly woman face in it, people will freak away .. through the ads ;) xD

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