Make money with Google Adsense with Vietnamese news site

To find and buy expired domains, I use the website expireddomains(.)net with the following filters:

• Domain extensions: .com, .net, or .org

• Trust Flow + Citation Flow > 10

• Domain contains the main keyword of the website

After filtering a list, I use Wayback Machine to check the site’s history — to make sure it hasn’t violated any policies. The final step is checking the backlink profile with Ahrefs. There are already many detailed guides on Google for finding expired domains, so you can explore more.

In short, using an aged domain with existing value will save you time on SEO. If you’re driving traffic from social media, this is also a smart choice — since older, trusted domains tend to get better reach and higher chances of being recommended.

See more products: Buy advertising accounts

Of course, WordPress — no debate here. Though people often complain about WordPress’s limitations (like security and speed), if your goal is clearly to make money with a website, WordPress is the top choice.

Why? Because:

• Creating a WordPress site is super easy, even for beginners

• Tons of pre-optimized themes are available; just install, no tweaking needed

• Many plugins for different needs

• Lots of tutorials and video guides

• Plenty of people willing to help (free or paid depending on the issue)

Among all the themes I’ve used with WordPress, I find Newspaper to be the best one for optimizing ad revenue. The combo of Newspaper + Google AdSense feels like a perfect match. Combine Google AdSense’s Auto Ads + Max Ad Load Mode with this theme, and you’ll get the best results.

The Newspaper theme costs around $50 (licensed version). Although there are lots of free shares and cracked versions online, I highly recommend buying the official version. This will greatly reduce your risk of malware or unexpected issues.

I once used a cracked theme infected with malware, and all the websites on the same host got compromised. Suddenly, they were filled with Japanese and Chinese spam pages and redirected to strange sites. It took me a month to clean everything up — super frustrating.

If your goal is to make serious money, I recommend using VPS hosting. While regular shared hosting is cheaper, I’ve learned the hard way through countless painful experiences that it’s not worth it. I no longer use cheap shared hosting plans.

The main reason? Every time my website received a spike in traffic (from trending SEO articles or viral posts on Facebook), the site would crash. When real-time traffic reached around 150–200 users, the site would start lagging, and anything beyond 200 meant a total blackout.

There’s no pain worse than watching money rain down and not being able to collect it.

Later on, I started using Cloudflare to reduce server load. If you can afford it, go for Cloudflare’s $20 Pro plan to unlock full features. Otherwise, the free plan is also decent. There are plenty of tutorials online about how to set up Cloudflare.

Bottom line: Use VPS + Cloudflare.

Over the years of building websites, I’ve used four main methods to create content:

• Method 1: Use the Wayback Machine to retrieve content from inactive websites. To Google, when this kind of content is brought back, it’s still seen as fresh and unique.

• Method 2: Copy content from private groups or fan pages where the posts haven’t been indexed by Google. (Not every post on social media gets indexed!)

• Method 3: Check Google Trends daily (set to the past 24 hours) and search for keywords like:

  • “Who is…”

  • “What is…”

  • “Clip…”

  These topics always have something hot to write about and can drive massive traffic. Especially “Who is…” combined with TikTok trends—this combo will never run out of content ideas.

• Method 4: Go the technical SEO route—do proper keyword research, create a keyword list, and hire writers (usually costs 50,000–100,000 VND/article). The bottom line: whatever you’re doing, be prepared to invest.

I follow two main SEO approaches:

1. Strengthen the domain authority: Once your domain is strong, any article you publish will rank more easily.

2. Target top-tier keywords: Focus on high-volume, trending keywords to maintain a steady stream of daily traffic.

For cheap backlinks, I use platforms like Fiverr and SEOClerk. For higher-quality backlinks and social backlink packages, I hire local Vietnamese services.

Honestly, when it comes to buying backlinks, it’s like trying different doctors—you never really know which one cured you. So, it’s hard to pinpoint which backlinks actually worked best.

First of all, let me say this: Google AdSense is not the only platform that allows you to place ads and make money. There are many others like Mgid, Adskeeper, etc.

But…
Google AdSense is still the gold standard. It’s almost mythical—everyone wants to “be loved” by AdSense. Some people say it’s hard to get approved, but in my experience, it’s actually one of the easiest if your website meets these criteria:

• Have 10–20 unique articles (not copied) before applying. If it’s a Vietnamese site, you can write them yourself. For English sites, hire writers on Fiverr (about $25 for 20 articles).

• The website must include these 5 basic pages: About Us, Contact, Privacy Policy, Terms and Conditions, Disclaimers.

• Install Google Analytics and Google Search Console, and make sure the site is indexed. (Many people apply before their site or content is even indexed.)

• It’s better if your site has some traffic—even just 10–20 daily visits is enough.

• If your application is rejected, just resubmit it once or twice more. Most eventually get approved.

Google AdSense is a sustainable way to make money online—if you do it right. I believe that anyone who writes decent content can succeed with this model. However, if you want to maximize traffic monetization and earn higher commissions, I still recommend giving affiliate marketing a try.