This story just popped in my head and I thought some other people might find it interesting. I can’t remember the exact year, but it’s safe to say it was about 15 years ago.
The Back Story
My business partner and I pivoted from refurbishing and selling used laptops to going all in on LakePlace.com (our lakeshore real estate business). Our laptop business was pretty big, but margins were shrinking quickly and we could see the writing on the wall. The used laptop business was going to follow the same path as the used VCR business. We needed to make some decisions and place a big bet on the future.
As I’ve detailed on this blog, Cameron and I put in what seemed like endless hours for a very, very long period of time without ever taking a dollar out of the new company. I still remember constantly telling my wife everything was going great, a statement that would always be met with “If things are going so great, why aren’t you getting paid?”
Ugh. I hated that question.
I had a stay-at-home wife, 3 kids, a house payment, a car payment and growing credit card debt. We had gotten used to having a relatively successful lifestyle during the laptop days but after months and months and months of getting that question, our bank account was getting smaller and smaller. Money was never really an issue, but now, it had become very clear that it soon would be.
The Hack
When we started LakePlace.com, we launched it as an advertising service for Realtors. Agents & brokers would pay a flat fee to advertise all of their lakeshore listings on our site. To convince them it was a good idea, we offered a free trial that lasted as long as it needed to last in order to show value. Every time a new listing was placed on our site, we immediately advertisied it on craigslist to drive extra traffic to their LP listing. We had about 1,200 agents in MN & WI keeping us very busy.
I don’t know where this idea came from, but at the time I was very familiar with Google Adsense & Craigslist…and becoming in desperate need of money. Back then we were looking into custom search engines for our website. At one point, Google was actually selling hardware for this purpose…but they also allowed you to build a custom search engine or white label search engine (maybe they still do) and host it on your own site.
I thought, what if I build a custom Google search engine, include Adsense ads, and advertise direct links to my search result pages on craigslist? I knew how much money we were spending on real estate related text ads…so I spent a few hours building this novel idea out.
I purchased a cheap “blah-blah.info” domain name, created a custom search site and started placing ads on craigslist.
How it Worked
It was a very simple idea. I went to my “blah-blah.info” search engine, Googled “Miami Real Estate” copy/pasted the search results URL to a craigslist ad with the title “Miami Houses & Condos For Sale.” Inside the ad, the content was short and sweet: One generic picture of Miami with text that said “Click Here to view virtually all properties for sale in Miami.” That link (craigslist used to allow links) would take the user to my custom search engine result for “Miami Real Estate” where the first 3 results were highly targeted Google ads, and the rest of the page was highly targeted search results.
I went through craigslist and placed the same ad for every major city in the U.S…and then sat back to watch my Adsense account.
I couldn’t believe it. I was making so much money, so quickly, that it scared the living sh!t out of me. “Oh no, this can’t be legal, can it? I’m going to get in trouble for this!” I thought to myself.
After running the craigslist ads for just a couple of hours, my adsense account was so filled with money that I immediately deleted all of the craigslist ads and waited to be contacted by Google. I had found a printing press for cash…and there was no way Google was going to let me get away with this…right?
I went back and forth from thinking this is going to get me in big trouble to telling myself that this hack is perfectly legit. If this wasn’t helpful, the user wouldn’t click on the links/ads. “I’m just doing them a favor and making their search super easy for them. I’m giving them exactly what they are looking for.”
The next morning, with butterflies in my stomach, I logged into my account and checked my Adsense balance — to my amazement, it was still there. I probably checked that balance 10 times per day for a couple of weeks while waiting for my Adsense check to be issued (or a call from Google)…but eventually, sure enough, I got my check.
How much was the check you ask? Well, I’m not going to get into that. But I will tell you that I never ran this hack again. It was way too easy and way too much money to take the chance. It provided a quick infusion of money when I needed it most, but I didn’t want to get greedy and I didn’t need the anxiety. My goal was and is to build a lasting, sustainable business that I can be proud of. This little idea, that took one day to implement, got me through a tough spot…but I’m happy that I realized then (and now) that shortcuts and greed are never the right answer.
The End
