Līve Ambitions

I understand the concept of arbitrage – buying cheap long-tail keywords and turning a profit for higher paying keywords.  And, I ‘ve also talked to people who’ve had incredible success with arbitrage in the past, but I question whether it still works today.

There are a few reasons why I question the effectiveness of arbitrage in today’s market:

1. Quality Score – With the advancement of Quality Score technology (Google), arbitrage sites would have a tougher time passing the filter.
2. Competition – With more people jumping into the game of arbitrage, we can expect to see competition in just about every niche we can think of.
3. Broad and Phrase Match – With the existence of broad and phrase keyword match, even non-arbitrage sites are able to compete for long-tail keywords.

I’m sure there are still some loop holes around it, but it’s pretty clear to see that things are only going to get tougher for arbitrage sites to make money.

Update:

I know I discussed long-tails as it relates to PPC/arbitrage, but how about SEO?  From an SEO perspective, long-tails are great!  Not only is it easier to rank for long-tail keywords organically, but also very cost-effective.