Google Demand Gen and search-to-search

It sounds odd to buy clicks from Google in order to sell clicks back to Google, yet that is one of the oldest forms of search arbitrage. It comes in two shapes. Search-to-search buys a click on a cheap search keyword and shows the visitor ads on dearer keywords. Display-to-search buys attention on feeds and video, today mostly through Demand Gen, and turns it into a search. Both run through Google Ads, and that is the catch: Google Ads has a policy that names arbitrage.

Search-to-search: buying intent wholesale

A currency booth at the airport buys euros at one rate and sells them at another. It adds no euros to the world. It earns from the gap between two prices for the same thing. Search-to-search does this with intent: it buys a search click in a market where that click is cheap and sells it where it is dear.

The gap exists because keyword prices are uneven. A broad, early-stage query costs little to advertise on. A specific, ready-to-buy query on a neighbouring subject costs much more, because advertisers know those searchers convert. A buyer bids on the cheap query through Google Ads or Microsoft Advertising, brings the searcher to a page, and presents the dearer queries as next steps. If the visitor clicks through and then clicks a sponsored listing, the buyer earns a share of the dearer click.

Search-to-search has one clear advantage: the visitor really was looking for something. It also has clear limits. Volume is capped by search volume, the buy price sits close to the sell price, and every keyword match type decision and negative keyword matters because one loose keyword can buy thousands of irrelevant clicks.

What Google Ads policy says

Google's advertising policies address this business directly. The destination requirements policy disapproves ads that lead to pages with insufficient original content, including destinations designed for the primary purpose of showing ads and destinations designed solely to send users elsewhere. Google's policy overview lists promoting such pages under abusing the ad network and uses the word arbitrage for it.

The compliant version of this model looks different. The destination is a real site with original content that would be worth visiting if it carried no ads at all, and the search feature is one part of it. Google's rules for Related Search on Content say the same from the sell side: the page must have standalone value, more content than ads, and must look substantially the same to a paid visitor as to someone who found it organically. Established metasearch and comparison sites operate this way under direct agreements. A newcomer with a thin page does not get the same treatment.

Demand Gen: Google’s answer to the social feed

Demand Gen is the Google Ads campaign type for image and video ads on Google's own scrolling surfaces. It replaced Discovery campaigns, absorbed Video action campaigns through a staged upgrade that Google scheduled to finish in April 2026, and serves on YouTube including Shorts, on Discover, on Gmail and, optionally, on the Google Display Network. Since March 2025 advertisers can choose which of those channels a campaign uses.

Performance Max deserves a mention because buyers ask about it. It is Google's fully automated campaign type that spreads one budget across Search, YouTube, Display, Discover, Gmail and Maps. The advertiser has little say over where each click comes from, which makes it hard to show a feed exactly what traffic was bought. The same destination rules apply.

The advertiser on the other side

Search-to-search has a reputation problem with advertisers, and understanding it is part of doing the job responsibly. An advertiser who bids on a keyword in Google Ads may find the click arrived through a partner site rather than Google itself. Google has responded by giving advertisers more visibility and control: full placement reporting for the search partner network became available for Search, Shopping and App campaigns in August 2025, and parked domains stopped being an ad surface in that network on 10 February 2026.

1. An advertiser buys a keyword: A car leasing firm creates a search campaign in Google Ads and bids on “SUV lease deals”. It expects its ad to appear when people search for that on Google.
2. One setting widens the reach: Search campaigns include an option to show ads on Google’s search partners as well as Google.com. It is switched on unless the advertiser turns it off. It is all or nothing: partners cannot be picked one by one, only excluded.
3. The ad appears on an arbitrage page: A visitor on a partner site taps a related search for “SUV lease deals”. The firm’s ad appears in the results there, and a click costs it about $1.00 (illustrative), the same budget as a click on Google.com.
4. Does it convert?: What matters to the advertiser is the conversion rate: do these clicks become enquiries? Some partner traffic performs well. Where it converts less, Google says it lowers the price automatically (smart pricing), and invalid clicks are credited back.
5. Seeing where the ads ran: For years partner sites were a black box. Since 2025 Google has reported the individual partner sites where Search, Shopping, App and Performance Max ads appeared, so an advertiser can see each Placement by name.
6. Excluding what does not work: A site that spends money without results can be added to an account-level placement exclusion list, and ads stop showing there. The blunt alternative is the opt-out: switch search partners off for the campaign.
7. One whole category removed: Google went further with parked domains: advertisers were opted out by default in 2025, and on 10 February 2026 parked domains stopped being part of the search partner network altogether.
8. Why arbitrageurs should care: Every exclusion removes a bidder from that page, and fewer bidders mean lower prices. A page that sends advertisers real customers keeps its demand. A page that does not is slowly switched off, one exclusion list at a time.

• Ask before you buy. Confirm with the feed provider that Google Ads or Microsoft Advertising traffic is approved for your account and page type.
• Build a destination worth visiting. Original content first, search feature second.
• Keep ad, keyword and page aligned. The query you bid on, the ad text and the page topic should match.
• Assume full visibility. Google can see both the click it sold you and the click you sold it.