Pay-Per-Click Fraud Exposed–Part II (Part 1)
Dean Phillips
According to Andy Jones, a member of the Best Practices Search Engine Forums, fraudulent clicks are just another aspect of the business. “Any of us that use AdWords or any other PPC has to pay for a certain percentage of fraudulent clicks,” he said in a forum discussion. “I factor it in as a cost of doing business.” Can you believe that? In other words, he’s saying, I know the pay-per-click companies are stealing my money, but it’s okay, because I’ve considered that fact ahead of time.
Unfortunately, that mentality is pervasive among pay-per-click advertisers. No wonder the pay-per-click companies aren’t making stopping pay-per-click fraud a top priority. Who can blame them? If their advertisers don’t care, why should they? Heck, with all of the money the pay-per-click companies are making, it’s actually more cost effective to issue an occasional refund, than to develop technology to eliminate click fraud.
And if you read between the lines of the following statement, Google even admitted as much:
In a recent filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Google acknowledged, “We are exposed to the risk of fraudulent clicks on our ads. We have regularly paid refunds related to fraudulent clicks and expect to do so in the future. If we are unable to stop this fraudulent activity, these refunds may increase. If we find new evidence of past fraudulent clicks, we may have to issue refunds retroactively of amounts previously paid to our Google Network members.” That statement doesn’t exactly instill any confidence, now does it?
