What is Searchviews?

Searchviews is the company blog of Reprise Media. We impart daily insights on Search Marketing, Social Media and SEO. Read More...

Contact Us

Send us a message at searchviews@
reprisemedia.com


Search

Archives


MyBlogLog - Readers

Click Fraud

« Previous Entries

SEM: Can Google Ever Win The War and Destroy Paid Links?

Written By Mark Pilatowski | August 4, 2008 | Share This |

Profile Optimization

Google guru Matt Cutts has been talking and blogging for years now about steps that Google has taken towards eradicating the power that paid links can have on their ranking algorithm. Like some other asymmetric wars Google has found that their vast resources are unable to stamp out the guerrilla forces of paid links. This is despite their vaunted algorithmic know-how. Sure, they have had limited success in identifying some of the larger text link networks but that has more to do with those same link- sellers outing themselves. This happened with Pay-Per-Post and some of the more popular text link brokers. Google was able find the disclaimer that some links were paid for or the advertisement for a text link broker and then retaliated by discounting all links from that site. Google is pushing paid link reports hard, relying on webmasters and SEOs to point them in the direction of the enemy. Google knows that this kind of intelligence is one of the only ways they can identify paid links.

(more…)

SEO: Would You Buy Optimization From This Man? How Not to Get Hustled by SEO Slicksters

Written By Noah Mallin | June 12, 2008 | Share This |

Herb Tarlek

For newbies the world of SEO can be a daunting and challenging place. Often a company rep looking to get their organization onboard the optimization train will want to be able to sell it back to the folks at the home office by quantifying exactly what they’ll be getting for their optimization bucks. Unfortunately that’s often where the SEO baddies step in.

As a rule of thumb anyone who tells you that they can guarantee a specific result through optimization is talking out of a part of their body where the sun don’t shine. There are plenty of shady operators out there who will “guarantee” rankings or traffic levels. Some of them will even tie their payment to your site’s rankings. Sounds good doesn’t it?

(more…)

Google Sued for Ad Fraud

Written By Drupad Sil | April 23, 2008 | Share This |

Google Legal

Legal firm Kabateck Brown Kellner filed a class action lawsuit against Google on Tuesday. The suit, filed on behalf of one David Almeida, accuses Google of deceiving its customers into paying for ads they didn’t expressly request. Elinor Mills at CNET gives the details:

“When participating in Google’s online auction-based advertising system, customers specify what they would be willing to pay for pay per-click for words or phrases that will trigger ads displayed on Google’s search site, as part of Google AdWords. They are also given the option of bidding for ads that appear on third-party Web sites, also called Google’s ‘content network’, which is part of Google AdSense.

On the system, customers see two blank boxes, one for typing in a bid for ads on Google.com, and another one, marked ‘optional’, for putting ads on content network sites. Sophisticated search engine marketers know to put a ‘0’ in the box for the content network AdSense sites if they don’t want ads there…

Google does not inform its advertisers that if they leave the box next to the content bid blank, Google will use the advertiser’s bid for clicks occurring on the content network, the lawsuit says.”

That’s not all, according to Dave Szetela at SearchEngineWatch:

“The truth is, advertisers don’t see this option during campaign creation. The only way for them to opt out of displaying ads on the content network is for advertisers to explicitly edit the settings of their campaign after creating it, and un-check the box labeled ‘Content Network’ – which is checked by default. Some would reason that this makes Google even more exposed to fraud charges.”

The question that people are raising is whether it makes sense for Google to knowingly exploit people using this tactic, draining Google advertisers of their online budgets. David Snyder at Marketing Pilgrim doesn’t think so:

“I’ve heard complaints such as these from several business owners…The issue is often discovered by advertisers when they see reports of low CTR.

The idea that Google would knowingly deceive advertisers seems a bit far fetched to me, well not that they would deceive, but that they did deceive.

Although I agree that they may have missed the boat on a usability flaw, which is something all of us are guilty of from time to time, I do not see that the giant of the online space has to gain by intentionally leading advertisers to third party publishers. In fact, such ad delivery means that Google has to give up a share of the advertising revenue earned. The company would probably prefer the ads be served on their own search network, where they can take in 100% of the revenue.”

We actually disagree. It’s definitely a gray area. The forced opt-out is a clear usability flaw of the kind that Google doesn’t typically make. But we also don’t think that someone at Google is intentionally trying to fleece advertisers by randomly placing their ads across a less relevant network.

This is more or less a legacy issue from the times when Google didn’t let you bid separately on content clicks - either you bought the whole shebang at the same price, or you were opted out of the network. The intent, at the time, was to prove to advertisers that the network had merit. Not necessarily equal to search, mind you (which is why the engines eventualyl allowed advertisers to set separate bid rates) but still valuable nontheless.

But at this point, the practice of auto-opting advertisers into the network, even if they leave the box blank, comes off as a bit sleazy.

Either way, it’s a story for AdWords advertisers to follow. Kabateck Brown Kellner has successfully sued Google for a $90 million click fraud settlement, and recently won a similar settlement from Yahoo. If the lawsuit is successful, and Google stops automatically extending campaigns into content, I wonder what the impact would be to their bottom-line? For now, Google has no comment.

Click Fraud Network Releases Q2 2007 Figures

Written By Drupad Sil | July 20, 2007 | Share This |

High Threat Heat Map.gif

The Click Fraud Network released a report earlier today stating that click fraud increased to 15.8% for Q2 2007.

The Click Fraud Network is a community of online advertisers, agencies, and search providers that provide data and work together to develop an industry solution to the problem of click fraud. Click fraud is formally defined as an internet crime that occurs in pay per click online advertising when a person, automated script, or computer program imitates the legitimate use of a web browser clicking on an ad for the purpose of generating a charge per click without having actually interest in the target of the ad’s link.

The report released by the Click Fraud Network puts Q2 2007 click fraud at 15.8%, one percent higher than Q1 2007, and 1.7% higher than the same quarter 2006. Other key findings showed an increase in click fraud rates on search engine content networks, like Google AdSense and Yahoo Publisher Network, moving up to 25.6% from 21.6% the previous quarter. Also, outside of North America, the greatest percentage of click fraud occurs in France, China, and Australia,

The main reason put forth by the Click Fraud Network for the increasing instances of click fraud is a noticeable increase in botnets, parked domain sites, and made-for-AdSense (MFA) sites. A botnet is a bot created with a Trojan that causes redirection of links and other connections to specified ads, artificially increasing the click-through rate. MFAs are pages created around AdSense keywords to ensure content is geared towards high-paying AdSense keywords, violating Google’s policy of making sure site content is relevant to the search.

On how the Click Fraud Network generates its data:

“Click fraud data is tracked and published on a quarterly basis for specific search providers, industries and trends. The service is unique in that it monitors online campaigns for click fraud by correlating data collected from search provider campaigns and the advertisers’ own web sites – providing the industry’s most accurate view of click fraud to date,”

We’ll have to see how search engines, advertisers, and internet security firms work to deal with the growing issue of botnets and fraudulent advertising. Regulation and litigation in this industry is slow because of a lack of understanding of the information and the rapidity of growth and change inherent to internet-related law, but that shouldn’t stop groups like the Click Fraud Network from finding new ways to stunt the growth of this newest form of spam.

SES SJ: Auditing Paid Listings And Click Fraud

Written By Reprise Media | August 8, 2006 | Share This |

Here we are: Another August, another flight to the West Coast, and another series of almost-live posts from the annual Search Engine Strategies conference in San Jose.
After arriving in San Jose late last night and attending Ask.com’s opening soiree at Club Fahrenheit, this morning was my first chance to actually head out to a session. […]

Here we are: Another August, another flight to the West Coast, and another series of almost-live posts from the annual Search Engine Strategies conference in San Jose.

After arriving in San Jose late last night and attending Ask.com’s opening soiree at Club Fahrenheit, this morning was my first chance to actually head out to a session. First session of the day? Auditing Paid Listings and Click Fraud.

Here’s a quick recap of a couple of the main issues touched on by the panel:

Thursday Links: Well, That’s Settled

Written By Reprise Media | July 27, 2006 | Share This |

thursday links settled.jpg

Finally, there’s a done deal in the Lane’s Gifts vs. Google click fraud case. Over the objections of 51 advertisers, Judge Joe Griffin approved the $90 million class action settlement - that’s 30 million in cash to the lawyers, 60 million in advertising credit to divvy up amongst the defrauded advertisers. The ruling is here (in .pdf), and more information is available for affected parties (and curious onlookers) in this FAQ. And now…the links:

iPod to be bored to death Ever since Microsoft confirmed rumors of its portable music player, it’s been hyped as an “iPod killer.” Memories of the Google’s-going-down-in-six-months prediction danced in our heads, but Microsoft is taking the long view with this one, says BetaNews, setting a “three-, four-, five-year” time line to dismantle Apple’s iTunes/iPod 1-2 punch. We’ll reportedly see Microsoft’s first effort, called Zune - a play on the word ‘tune’ and, uh…zephyr…zebra…can we have a hint? Anyway, it’ll street within a matter of months, followed by a second device next year.

“Turn up the power all NIGHT-Night-night-night…” Google’s AdSense ads are now playing on radios, portable and otherwise, in Detroit, says Cnet. Radio AdSense uses technology from dMarc (bought by Google in January), that “automates the process of buying ads, placing them in time slots and tracking them, which is usually done by ad agencies over the phone,” according to experts. It could lead to lower ad prices, higher sales, cats and dogs living together…or it could lead to, er, a rerun of the Google Print ads misadventure.

Parking foul! Call it a peeve. BoingBoing spotted the Flickr account of one ‘ycantpark,’ who highlights the discourteous - and sometimes dangerous - parking habits evidenced in Yahoo!’s company lot (and an anonymous reader points out many more). We realize picking on one company isn’t exactly fair, as every place we’ve ever worked had this exact same problem, so we welcome the chance for equal opportunity scolding. If you’ve got photos of Google’s, Microsoft’s or Ask’s parking lot transgressions, we’d love to see those, too.

Speaking of transgressions… Come on, we’ve all had that feeling, right? Sitting there at the computer, entering a query into Google’s search box, we’ve all at some point or another thought, “I wish there was a musical play about this activity.” No? Well, you got one anyway, and it’s playing at the Minnesota fringe festival this August. Look out for “Librarians, DJs and zombies” singing about “dangers of information ubiguity.” Don’t miss the showstopper, “Did You Mean: Ubiquity,” which is what we got when we Googled “ubiguity” (via Philipp Lenssen).

How Handy: Google’s New Click Fraud Estimation Tool

Written By Reprise Media | July 26, 2006 | Share This |

google click fraud tool.jpg

If you’re an AdWords advertiser, chances re you’ve wished more than once that Google would just give you the straight story on the bad clicks you’ve been getting. Well, the guessing games could be coming to an end, as the Inside AdWords blog announces a “new AdWords feature enabling advertisers to have a much more detailed picture of invalid click activity in their account.”

Because Google’s been lurching toward increasing openness on the subject of click fraud since their 90 million dollar settlement, this doesn’t quite rate as a ‘flying pig’ moment, but it’s still an entirely welcome development. Two new check boxes, ‘Invalid Clicks’ and ‘Invalid Clicks Rate’ (found under the ‘Account’ tab in ‘Advanced Options’) “will show virtually all the invalid clicks affecting an account,” writes Trust & Safety Business Manager Shuman Ghosemajumder. He goes on to explain the need for the tool:

“One of the most controversial issues related to the topic of click fraud has been estimating how big the problem is. Estimates from third-parties (usually from consultants who have a financial incentive to make the problem seem very large) have been both inconsistent and greatly exaggerated due to their methodologies. Advertisers have always been able to compare their log data with their AdWords charges to calculate an estimate of the number of invalid clicks in their own account. This new tool will make estimating invalid click activity much easier.”

We applaud this move toward transparency, and we can forgive that swipe at ‘third party estimates’ - even though Google’s long-standing opacity on the subject necessitated outside assessments. We wonder how closely the numbers provided by Google’s new tool will match up to the ones we’ve been getting using third party tracking… Check out the AdWords Help tutorial on how to get started with the new tool here.

Monday Links - “Objection!” Edition

Written By Reprise Media | July 24, 2006 | Share This |

monday links - objection.jpg

Although a judge has given preliminary approval to a class-action click fraud settlement between Google and its advertisers, not everyone is happy with divvying up just 60 million bucks in advertising credit. A two-day hearing starts today in which the court will hear the substance of 51 objections to the settlement, says the AP. We’ll keep you posted on the final judgement. In the meantime? Links:

Bezooooos iiiiin spaaaaaace Jeff Bezos is most famous as founder and CEO of Amazon.com, but it’s one of his extra-curricular hobbies that’s getting a lot of attention these days. Through a company called Blue Origin, Bezos wants to build a launch site in Texas that would serve as a base for the development of private space flights. Says the AP, an environmental study submitted to the FAA details some of the plans, including information about the prospective space ship itself, which would take off and land vertically. Start saving your cash now, space enthusiasts: Blue Origin could be sending up weekly flights as early as 2010.

But will he apologize for the piles of free coasters? Charlie Rose chatted up erstwhile AOL man Steve Case for a show that aired Friday, and the ex-CEO said he was “sorry” for the merger with Time Warner, reports Reuters. You know, the one that erased 200 million smackers and put a lead anchor around the companies’ collective neck that they’re still struggling to shake off? Well, his bad. Still, he believed it was “a good idea.” Aww, let’s give him a do-over, for old time’s sake!

Not such a ‘Desperate’ move after all In the Spring, ABC tested out free online streaming versions of some of its more popular offerings, with a single sponsor advertising on each show. How’d it do? Jeff Jarvis previews an AdAge article (check tomorrow) that says viewers remembered 87 percent of the streaming ads, versus about 24 percent for traditional television (think that has something to do with fewer sponsors per program?). Those numbers mean the network will bring the streaming shows back again in the fall. Now, if we could only get them to quit trying to mess with our DVRs…

We thought the ‘use Google’ approach only worked if you were a Google employee Philipp Lenssen links to the blog of Damien Mulley, who provides step-by-step instructions for under-socialized nerds to “get a girl and get laid” using nothing but Google (and Google services like Maps, Alerts and Orkut…Orkut?!). A pleasing sample of dry Irish wit…we hope.

Google on Click Fraud: Whatevs!

Written By Reprise Media | July 10, 2006 | Share This |

google click fraud whatever.JPG

We admit, ‘whatevs’ is not an exact quote. The exact quote is, “Let it happen,” and it was uttered by Google CEO Eric Schmidt in March at Stanford University. Blogged by Digital Micro-Markets’ Donna Bogatin yesterday, those three little words caught fire and unleashed a torrent of discussion at Threadwatch and other sites. Many folks disdained Schmidt’s reasoning and attitude.

Here’s the thing: he’s right.

Before it gets flamey in here, let’s look at the quote in context. Schimdt was predicting what would happen if Google did absolutely nothing at all to police click fraud:

“Eventually, the price that the advertiser is willing to pay for the conversion will decline, because the advertiser will realize that these are bad clicks, in other words, the value of the ad declines, so over some amount of time, the system is in-fact, self-correcting. In fact, there is a perfect economic solution which is to let it happen.”

He goes on to say that advertisers would factor losses to click fraud into the “cost of doing business.” Of course, he says, Google does “go ahead and try to detect [click fraud] and eliminate it,” since “it is a bad thing,” and, besides, “great fun” to fight.

While you might be forgiven for taking issue with this ‘what the hey’ approach to the problem (and the implication that it’s not so much a problem as an entertaining distraction), it’s difficult to argue with the substance of Schmidt’s words. Even with the most sophisticated tracking system, click fraud is a fact: savvy advertisers have to allow for its existence in ROI calculations. As much as Google and the other engines are blamed for not keeping a tighter rein on click fraud, we doubt very much that it’s possible to completely eradicate ‘fraudulent’ clicks because it’s impossible to know what the intent behind each and every click is.

Here’s the rub. Search lives in a trackable world – one where every single step of the process can be monitored. Advertisers have no excuse not to know how much they’re willing to pay to acquire a customer, and it’s each advertiser’s responsibility to manage the keywords they’re buying and the bids they’re setting to ensure that they’re receiving qualified traffic.

We’ve also heard and seen many claims that Google’s bound to be turning a blind eye to click fraud because, in the end, it puts more money in their pocket. This is just absolute foolishness. Think about it: Google’s building a multi-billion dollar company based almost exclusively on an advertising model that is cost-effective and efficient. Click fraud raises costs and inefficiencies in the market. Start pissing off your advertisers and wasting their money, and they’ll turn elsewhere. We doubt that Google is making a conscious decision to trade short-term gain for something that may, ultimately, undermine their entire system and take their growth off the tracks.

In fact (believe it or not), Google (and the other major engines) do a good job of proactively crediting fraudulent clicks back to our firm, and resolving other disputes we’ve had in a fair manner.

Click Fraud: The $800 Million Dollar Problem

Written By Reprise Media | July 6, 2006 | Share This |

click fraud 800 mil.JPG

It’s no secret that many of the ad clicks advertisers get in their pay-per-click campaigns aren’t exactly on the level. And it’s no surprise that if you ask the advertisers, they’ll tell you the problem is bigger than the engines are letting on. Still, when you see a click fraud dollar amount in the neighborhood of 800 million, it’ll make you sit up straight. That’s the figure reached by market research outfit Outsell in a survey of 407 online advertisers conducted in May, reports News.com, and the same survey pegs the rate of click fraud at 14.6 percent.

To put that 800 mil in perspective, Google recently agreed to settle a class action click fraud suit, covering all outstanding complaints, to the tune of $90 million - and $30 million of that goes straight to the lawyers (the suit is still pending approval of the claimants, some of whom aren’t happy with the low payout). Yahoo is settling a click fraud case of its own, although the final damage on that won’t be determined until a retired federal judge helps evaluate the veracity of past click fraud complaints.

According to Outsell’s survey, the damage to PPC advertising goes beyond $800 million, which represents cash that advertisers believe they’ve spent on fraudulent clicks. Advertisers also report that the click fraud risk has caused them to curtail online ad spending by an additional $500 million. And even if you think the money seems a little high, it’s alarming that 27 percent of the surveyed advertisers said they reduced their PPC spending or eliminated it entirely.

Of course, the engines acknowledge click fraud, even if they publicly estimate the problem to be small. The question is, how do they plan to deal with advertiser confidence? According to ClickZ, the Outsell report’s lead analyst, Chuck Richard, predicts that “All these pressures are going to accelerate the introduction of CPA programs and the adoption of them.” Indeed, Google’s already toying with a CPA ad network, which would diminish fraud by requiring additional actions after the click before paying out. Richard also suggests that the engines become more transparent about their click fraud combat - such a provision is part of the Yahoo! settlement.

However, Richard cautions, “It’s not a solution. Just announcing figures is very important, but I think the similarities are clear, just as every security system has been hacked, people out there are just immensely creative in finding ways around the system…[the engines] are always going to be at least a half-step behind the people out to defraud them.”

« Previous Entries