At SMX Matt Cutts said you can turn Google's personalized web search results off by adding &pws=0 to the URL of a search query. If you are logged into your Google Account this link shows your personalized version, while this one shows the general unpersonalized SERP.

eBay recently banned search arbitrage, and Google is also trying to clean up their network. eWhisper posted that he thought the recent clean up may be an attempt to make the network look more appealing before showing advertisers what URLs their ads appear on. A neverending Webmasterworld thread highlights that many thin AdSense publishers got emails from Google stating that "our specialists found that your business model is not a good fit for the AdSense program".

The hard part is both judging intent and forcing quality. On one front Google offers a heat map showing you that your ads should go in the middle of your content, then they tell you to use AdWords to drive traffic to AdSense sites, and in their guidelines they state:

No Google ad may be placed on pages published specifically for the purpose of showing ads, whether or not the page content is relevant

In a market where virtually every business arbitrages other markets what is an improper business model? SEO is a form of arbitrage. I even had one engine call me up and ask to pay me to spam arbitraging Google's search results. That engine may even be one of Google's largest syndication partners! As ShoeMoney pointed out, many large arbitragers will continue arbitraging. Companies like Business.com or the 100s of shopping search engines are not going to get booted out of syndicating ads.

I think the big long-term distinction between what Google considers low quality and of quality is going to be brand equity. Do people visit your site from channels other than Google? Large brands get more return out of buzz marketing, while smaller businesses lean hard on search. inbound made a great post in that WMW thread about the arbitrage and MFA changes, which notes that Google is getting better at coming up with proxies for visitor value.

Based on Google's authority-centric relevancy algorithms and this move it is clear that Google wants to trust the larger businesses so they have less work to do policing the web. The way around getting forked by Google is to create something that does not need Google to exist. Create the type of site that people would link at if Google did not exist, and the type of site that they would want to advertise on directly. I have a large AdSense site that needs a re-brand and some serious work on content quality if it is going to stay viable in years to come.

For those who just got the death letter here are a few options:

• Buy old trusted sites with a clean core and real value add. do arbitrage stuff off of them

• Look to other related programs like YPN, Searchfeed, and Ask.com's feed.
• If your site is of low value consider showing fewer ads short term...to make up for non arbitrage ads and to lower your risk profile.
• Create a new corporation, open up a new AdSense account and figure out ways to get your sites approved.
• Publish fewer and higher quality sites with fewer ad units on each page.

From a risk management perspective, I think every web publisher should own at least one real branded site, even if it offers low returns for the amount of work required to maintain it.

Google bought YouTube, but is struggling with ironing out ad revenue shares and advertising. What is the easiest way for Google to fix these issues? Integrate YouTube and Google Video directly into Google's search results.

Using what legal loopholes they may and something they call universal search, you can now listen to music videos directly from Google.com search results. This creates a marketplace that many businesses will need to be in to stay relevant, destroys a whole vertical of web spam, AND allows Google to monetize the organic search results (via YouTube). If you think video is a passing fad you bet wrong, but if you are doing it you are best off branding your videos to be associated with your domain name and uploading them to YouTube. Eli offered tips on how to make $1,000 a month re-purposing video, but now the number is more like $20,000.

Sure Google has done many YouTube users wrong, but if you need exposure, Google turned back the clock on SEO. Top ranking have never been easier. All you need to succeed is to format your content in video and upload it to YouTube.

Tim O'Reilly compares Google and Amazon to offline companies:

If Google or Amazon were your bank or credit card, they'd let you know which merchants had the best prices for the same products, so you'd be a smarter shopper next time. They'd let merchants know what products were popular with people who also bought related products. They'd help merchants stock the right products by zip code. They'd let you know when you were spending more on dining out than you have set in your family budget. They'd let you know when you were approaching your credit limit, with a real-time fuel gauge, not just a "Sorry, your card has been declined."

Universal search mixes videos and news in the organic search results and recommends other verticals at the top of the search results. And Google is testing a broader array of layouts.

By making search richer you have less reason to leave Google. Google started with targeted text ads, but it is even better if they can combine their targeting with trusted brands and offers while making their ads look like a useful piece of content in any format.

Google is further commoditizing the role of the ad agency. They are signing up advertisers interested in trying their new Ad Creation Marketplace:

In the Ad Creation Marketplace, you'll find industry professionals who can provide script writing, editing, production, and voice-over talent at an affordable package cost. It's free to search for and send project bids to specialists, and you aren't under any obligation to work with them until you accept a bid.

Google's great value has been in targeting and tracking, but text and image ads are not as emotionally appealing as video ads. As they try to move up the value chain to caputre branding ad dollars they are trying to create a support ecosystem that helps the market grow quickly and keeps the market as efficient as possible.

How much does Google expect ad production to cost? Crumbs:

Once you accept a specialist's bid, you might expect to spend anywhere between $100 and $1000 for your ad.

YouTube is taking over the organic search results, and they are buying a ton of AdWords ads. Google doesn't even take the time to write relevant ads when promoting YouTube. Their second ranked ad for the word music doesn't even contain the word music.

Clearly with an ad so irrelevant they are not factoring in quality score into YouTube's ad position, or if they are they are paying themselves over $5 a click for the word music. How is a competing service to compete when they are forced to write relevant ads to be able to afford the click, and Google serves itself sloppy targeted broad reaching branded ads?

As Google arbitrages itself one vertical at a time the only businesses that are safe are:

• those that get traffic AROUND Google

• those that provide Google with the high quality content that Google is forced to rely on to keep spam out of their SERPs
• those that Google does not have enough data or brand strength to compete with, or have some important offline component
• those that are so small that Google doesn't want to compete