First off, we're not spamming the search engines. Spam, by definition, is unsolicited and is sent by someone who has little concern for who receives it. The websites will all be highly-optimized, and optimized in such a way that they are put in front of the eyes of those who are looking for a specific solution to their problems; a solution we provide that is 100% legitimate. So, by it's very nature, this network of sites is not spam.

That being said, I agree that automation is key here. But, automation ≠ bad design and content. There are automated ways to go about generating quality designs and content. All that's necessary is that the people manning the tools to do so know what they're doing.

Point taken about the designers. Going forward, I will be making everything as cut and dry as possible, i.e they should do A, B, and C, no questions asked.

I really like your idea about hiring a dev to code something that can output mass websites that aren't 100% replicas of one another, so I will look into that.

I don't doubt building 1K sites in a week is possible, but you have to remember that while my knowledge of this industry is pretty advanced for my age, I am still young, so I don't know what's all out there in terms of software that makes the ability to build 1K sites in a week a breeze. So, do you think you could recommend pieces of software that would assist me in that endeavor?