A new investigation by Press Gazette, based on testimonies from former employees of Clickout Media, has revealed the scale of the company's parasitic SEO business. According to one of the whistleblowers, Clickout Media's portfolio includes up to 300 websites.
Among the acquisitions made by Clickout Media are iGaming portals Gambling Insider, which was reportedly purchased for no less than $15.9 million, and CasinoBeats. Other notable purchases include sports-related sites such as Football Blog, She Kicks, Sportslens, Sportscasting UK, and the technology site Techopedia.
One of the sellers told Press Gazette that they were unaware of the buyer's connection to Clickout Media until after the deal was finalized.
According to former employees, after a website is acquired, it goes through a consistent cycle. The editorial team continues to operate to maintain the domain's reputation, but eventually, casino-themed content and AI-generated articles replace the original content, leading to staff layoffs. Salaries during this phase were around $1,200 per month for eight articles a day.
Press Gazette reports that Google has likely deindexed Esports Insider and Videogamer following Clickout Media's acquisition, which was followed by mass layoffs and the effective closure of editorial teams.