I need to start off by saying I’m not a huge proponent of Made for Adsense sites (MFA)… so: “I’m not a huge proponent of Made for Adsense sites.”  There, I said it.

Now, with that out of the way, MFA is still a very effective and EASY way to make money online.  I’m not trying to run an MFA empire - I’d rather build sites that provide some value to the user than slap together a few hundred Mad for Adsense sites and rake in the cash.  Personal preference.  Still, for the sake of experimenting, I went ahead and built a completely MFA site a few months ago, pointed a few links at it (well under 100, most as forum signatures) and left it to its own devices.

What amazes me is that when I check my adsense data, this site is ALWAYS performing well.  We’re talking CTR between 30-70%, depending on the month.  Granted, it gets limited traffic, but even in a slow traffic month, where it received just under 30 page impressions, it still produced around $10.  Keep in mind, this site took 10 minutes for me to make, and it hasn’t been promoted at ALL.

The funny thing for me was watching my wife react to the MFA site after it was built.  Working in web development, it’s easy to forget how the average web user views a site.  When I set my wife loose on the rough design of the site (I place JPEGs of adsense blocks on a page before my code gets dropped in) she immediately went after the adsense links.  This made it increasingly clear to me why people have been abusing adsense for years:

10 minutes of work = $150 per year (or lots more if you actually promote the site), in perpetuity.

For me, my conscience won’t allow me put any more of these types of sites online… but I surely understand now why others do.