Adwords Arbitrage

Can it work

[ffctas]

I have seen companies, specifically one that hosts small business stores, seemingly try to use some kind of arbitrage for profiting from Adwords.
They advertise on all kinds of keywords and do a good job of optimizing ads for good click thru. Their bids are just good enough to get them on the first page.
If you click on their ad you are directed to one of their pages. Obviously, they are signed up with ADsense because google adwords are prominent on this page. Their customers actual product listings are well down the page.
Are they hoping that a customer will click on a high ranking keyword so that they get a payment greater than what they would have to pay to get the orignial impression? It must work, they advertise a huge amount. What could the margins be?

[jtara]

Are you sure of who it is doing the advertising?

It could be the proprieters of the stores. Or (more likely) it could be affiliates. There's a pretty good supply of affiliates that are willing to spend more than they make. They will give up after a while, but, like I said, there's a good and seemingly endless supply of the gullible.

The Adsense may or may not have anything to do with arbitrage. If these are "free" small business stores, they need to get revenue from somewhere, and thus the Adsense.

Not a great deal for the store proprieters - I'd certainly avoid something like this. Who wants a store where you have to scroll down past ads to get to the store?