Comments on: Google to offer advertisers click fraud stats

Advertisers will be able to see number of invalid clicks, as well as what percentage that represents of total clicks.

[flashtogo]

15 to 20% ? You wish!

We at FlashToGo.com are a long time advertisers on Google,
Overture and many others. Very unfortunately to say that the
Click Fraud goes well over 20%.

Our advice is, if you are serious about PPC, you should create
your own machanisms to track the click troughs. You can easily
find several 25 bucks softwares out there that generates click-
throughs. Those softwares simulates diffrent IP#s etcetera.

At FlashToGo we create an "intro" page that require users to
manually click to enter the site, so, by simply comparing the
visitors that come to the intro page and within the site itself, you
have a soomewhat reliable way to measure fraudulent clicks.

[flashtogo]

15 to 20% ? You wish!

We at FlashToGo.com are a long time advertisers on Google,
Overture and many others. Very unfortunately to say that the
Click Fraud goes well over 20%.

Our advice is, if you are serious about PPC, you should create
your own machanisms to track the click troughs. You can easily
find several 25 bucks softwares out there that generates click-
throughs. Those softwares simulates diffrent IP#s etcetera.

At FlashToGo.com we have created an "intro" page that requires
users to manually click to enter the site so that, by simply
comparing the visitors that come to the intro page and those
who actually come in to the site itself, you have a somewhat
reliable way to measure fraudulent clicks.

[djpaisley]

better yet...

do organic optimization instead ... or just cut out your downstream ppc..

[208mbrandon]

This gesture is a mockery of the true problem

As has been said, 15 to 20 percent is so laughably low, it strains credulity.

The search engines are trying to frame click fraud as only multiple clicks originating from the same IP when the definition should be "clicks generated by users who have no genuine intention other than generating revenue for an unrelated third party or draining ad budget from a competitor". The fraudsters moved beyond this amateur-hour technique a long time ago. Ghosting, anonymizing, bot-nets, etc. all engage in click fraud without identical IP's. Hiring click slaves in low wage countries is also a new favorite. In fact, after analyzing the logs, I found that half of my PPC traffic came from India, Africa, and some former Eastern Bloc countries, whereas only about 15% of my non-PPC traffic came from those countries. Zero percent of traffic from those countries, whether PPC or otherwise, actually converted into a lead, sale, or anything else of value.

CNET should pull up a Google search with the keyphrase "earn rupees clicking ads". You will see how prevalent this industry has become.

My company used a 1 pixel java pop up to track click fraud. The pixel loaded only one second after the page loaded. Fully eighty-three percent of our PPC visitors never loaded that pixel, giving us incontrovertible proof that these were not human eyeballs. Ninety-five percent of our non-PPC visitors did load the pixel, which is what you would expect since about 5 percent of browsers are not Java-enabled.

No... natural optimization, coupled with inbound linking strategies are the only way to generate meaningful ROI these days.

Mark
Free Link Popularity E-Course at http://www.viralinks.com/Viralinks_intro.htm

[Sandra_Kerns]

You are absolutely right

Your detailed description of the extent of click fraud from the Google & Yahoo Ad sense offering is absolutely the best that I have read.
Bravo - my hat off to you :)

Now we have been aware of this same problem for some time, although we did not do as mathematically based analysis as you have done. That is why we switched most of our Ad dollars to Anoox, which:
1- Does not offer Ad sense incentive to Web site owners to engage in click fraud
2- Is not-for-profit so it is much better value.
Check them out, and you will see what I mean:
www.anoox.com

And again thanx on your well analyzed write up.

[Sandra_Kerns]

Only one way to avoid Click Fraud of Google or Yahoo

The Google & Yahoo PPC click fraud is what I have been writing about for some time. The SOURCE of this problem is the Google AdSense and equivalent of Yahoo. That is Web sites who get paid by anonymous users clicking on Google or Yahoo Ads
on their Web pages. Many if not all of these Web sites have nothing to SELL, their only source of revenues is click on Google or Yahoo Ads that are on their web pages. So of course then the potential for click fraud is ENORMOUS due to this monetary incentive that they have for (fake) clicks on the Google or Yahoo Ads that are on their web pages. And since these clicks are by anonymous users, then as others have noted, it is very easy for them to fool Google or Yahoo click tracker by clearing Cookies, changing IP via proxy severs and clicking again.

So the only way around this click fraud is a search engine that does not offer such an incentive to fraudsters. That is why we have been using AnooX search engine:
www.anoox.com
and I have been recommending all who want to avoid click fraud to do same. Also since Anoox
is a "not-for-profit" the cost of PPC advertising through them is far lower than Google or Yahoo.

[208mbrandon]

Unfortunately, you have next to no search volume...

which means that it would take years for your minimum deposit to be used up.

Who has that kind of time?

Mark
Free Link Building E-Course at http://www.viralinks.com

[Andrew J Glina]

Welcome back

Surprise surprise, you are promoting AnooX again. Please tell me how AnooX is "not-for-profit" and Open when they require;

A $300 processing fee
10% of all profits
$7500 for support per server

...before you can recieve the source code "for free"? Where does this money go then?

http://www.anoox.com/open-source-overview.jsp

[adamHR]

Interesting development

There was no mention in the article if Google is refunding the frasud amount to the customers. Does any one know if this is so?. It would seem that this is the fair and just thing to do..

[flashtogo]

Google is being sued for that

We at FlashToGo.com have received a mere 60 bucks credit for
what they call erroneous clicks. We spend a a few thousand dollars
a month, for years now. So, 60.00 is absolutely ridiculous. :-)

Google is being sued over these fradulent clicks and tried to settled
at US$ 90 M, which was refused (of course). It was published right
here on CNET, about a week or two ago.