[oneloop]

There's so many things wrong with what you said.

A) It's not true that people "splurge" it on adwords. Adwords gives you a finite amount, so you have an interest in being as efficient as possible, at least if you care about your cause. Also, the effect on bid pressure is greater if you bid the same as the nr 1 bidder than if you "splurge it" by bidding $100/click, see D)

B) trials are like £75. Once you spend it, it's gone. You can't get more. It's not gonna bankrupt your the competitors.

C) Non-profits can't "pour it into really competitive keywords". They're limited in what they can do, they can't go bid on life insurance with google's money. They're also limited to a maximum bid of $2/click.

D) Regarding jacking up the price being a real benefit for google... This one is more complicated but you can't be sure without looking at the numbers. Because on the one hand you increase competition, but on the other google only get actual revenue from N-1 ad slots.

You're just guessing.