Pay Per Click Fraud puts Online Advertisers at Risk
Participants in popular pay-per-click advertising programs face the risk of fraud from fraudulent clicks designed to put advertising commissions in the pockets of Internet scammers or deplete your advertising budget.
Indianapolis, IN (PRWEB) July 25, 2004 -- As the price for online
"pay-per-click" internet advertising has increased, website operators are
becoming alarmed about "Click Fraud." According to Indianapolis based Internet
marketing firm e-Practical Solutions www.e-psinc.com, click fraud is a scheme that takes advantage
of online advertising programs like those offered by Google, MarketBanker and
Yahoo's Overture division. A fraudulent website is set up that participates in
programs like Google's AdSense program. Unlike legitimate websites that attract
human visitors to the site, fraudsters use software "bots" or boiler-rooms of
low wage employees to generate clicks on ads, and then collect commission from
pay-per-click programs.
In June, a federal grand jury returned an
indictment against Michael Anthony Bradley of Oak Park California who was
charged with interfering with commerce and 10 counts of wire fraud for a scheme
involving Google's cost-per-click program. Bradley's arrest is a rarity due to
the fact that Click Fraud is very difficult to detect. In addition it can be
devastating for companies that count on cost-per-click advertising to find
customers. According to e-Practical's Seidle, "We've seen prices for
pay-per-click go from $ 0.15 cents to an average of $ .40 cents to several
dollars in some categories per click in the last two years. This cost increase
has not equated to an increase in sales for many website operators – which has
many people asking why they are paying more."
Click fraud hurts
advertisers by driving up the cost of each click because many online advertising
programs adjust the price of each click based on the popularity of the click and
the number of competing advertisers. Because it can take less than a few seconds
to register thousands of clicks, "Click fraud can quickly deplete your pay per
click marketing program and leave you with very little to show for it," says
e-Practical Solutions consultant Mike Seidle.
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." Website operators can reduce the
risk of being hit by click fraud by regularly auditing their website’s log and
immediately reporting suspicious traffic to pay-per-click programs. Web site
operators who are unfamiliar with analyzing their site’s raw web log files,
e-Practical's Seidle points out, "There are some great off the shelf log
software products like ClickTracks, WebTrends, and AWStats that make it fairly
easy to identify patterns in your website's traffic."
"That's one
reason we advise our clients to build complete Internet marketing programs, with
traffic tracking, around a variety of lead building sources so you don't pay for
every visit to your website and can identify suspicious activity." Other
Internet marketing programs include organic search engine optimization;
affiliate programs and professional email marketing services like those offered
by Indianapolis firms Neighborhood E-mail - www.neighborhoodemail.com and Exact Target – www.exactarget.com
About E-Practical Solutions
e-Practical Solutions is an
Internet marketing firm that focuses on realizing the potential of their
client’s Internet investment. E-Practical offers real-world proven, high value
solutions to maximizing website traffic, improving website conversion rate and
improving return on investment for Internet properties. Clients include Indiana
Health Careers, AM Real Estate and Gauge Media.
Press Contact: Jim
Mendenhall, (317) 286-4002, e-mail protected from spam bots
Online: www.e-psinc.com
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Source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/7/prweb143118.htm