Frustratingly erratic AdSense EPC

Maybe I need some automated budget tools

[martingale]

I run AdWords and AdSense both, and my goal is to pay for AdWords with AdSense revenue to get extra visitors for "zero cost". I don't make any money on AdWords visitors, but if some of them like my site and bookmark it, I grow my organic traffic a little faster. I just come in once a week and adjust my AdWords bids and budget so that it roughly equals my AdSense revenues, to ensure I break even. Worked great for months--but not anymore.

Since mid-February it's been a disaster. My EPC's have been so erratic that it's impossible to make it balance. EPC will tank for a couple of days and I'll lower my AdWords bids. Bingo, the next day my EPC is at an all time high--but not for long. I return to normal, and EPC hits bottom barrel again. It's almost as if Google is adjusting my AdSense EPC to ensure that it's always less than my AdSense bid--I know they're not, that's tinfoil hat stuff, but it feels like it.

If EPC's are gonna stay low that's fine, I will just lower what I spend on AdWords. If EPC's are gonna stay high, that's fine, I will increase on AdWords. Is AdSense more erratic than usual for everybody else right now or just me?

If it's gonna stay schizophrenic like this, would the google api help me somehow? Maybe I could write a little tool to monitor my EPC in realtime and constantly update my AdWords bids to match. Sounds like it probably wouldn't work though, if AdSense really is fundamentally unpredictable now I'm best just spending the minimum on AdWords and forgetting about it.

My CTR's and traffic volumes are "normal" (they fluctuate, but no worse thane ver). Targetting on my site looks good. I know there's no answer or solution to this, I realize that AdSense is a crap shoot. I just wanted to rant a bit. Thanks, I'm done.

[Nathan]

Here's an easy solution... base your Adwords budget on LAST MONTHS Adsense revenue!

[doingthistoolong]

Wed, Thurs, Friday (this week) I had similar loading, similar impressions - many thousands, so it's a reasonable sample.

Same ads, same pages, same content.

Wed and Friday, EPC was 1/3 of what it was on Thursday.

Go figure!

[sailorjwd]

Have you tried adding many 2 and 3 and even four word phrases to your adwords at 5 or 6 cents? I'm not having much trouble getting a 3 or 4 to one return from adsense revenue. Since Feb 2 about 80% of my visitors are through adwords. I've got about 10,000 adwords entries.

(sorry if this is leaning towards wrong forum)