Coping with click fraud

When you start using pay-per-click search engines, the biggest concern you have, after your actual conversion rate, is click fraud. It is very important to your business that you are aware of what click fraud is.

Click fraud occurs for a few reasons. For programs such as Google’s AdWords, click fraud comes from unethical webmasters trying to increase their AdSense income. This does not necessarily mean discontinue your ads throughout that part of Google’s network, but it does mean you need to keep a closer watch on such clicks, so that any fraud may be quickly detected and reported.

Another form of click fraud comes from your competition. Sometimes a competitor will click repeatedly on your ad simply in an attempt to drain your account and keep your ad from showing. This happens right on the search engine pages, and can add up rapidly.

A final form is sometimes suspected of the more minor pay-per-click search engines, which is that they simply fail to deliver the clicks you ordered, at least in terms of real visitors.

How do you cope? First and foremost, have an excellent ad tracking system in place. This can be as simple as adding a tracking term to the end of each ad directed to your own website (this does not work if you are directing to a website for which you cannot view the statistics) by adding a “?trackingterm” without the quotes to the end of your link. This should show up as a separate page in your statistics.

If you want to get more sophisticated, use an ad tracking program or service. You will need to consider your needs when using most ad tracking companies, as there is a monthly cost. However, this cost can typically be made up by your ability to learn which ads are producing the most income.

Some companies to consider:

Clickalyzer - Track sales and visitor's paths through your site. Lots of power to this one, but not cheap.
Atlas OnePoint - Manage your pay-per-click bids and save time and money. 14 day free trial. Range of prices depending on how simple or complex your needs are. Custom packages available.

Software:

ProAnalyzer - One time cost and hosted on your server. Maybe a little more basic than the ad tracking services, but good for a start at least.

Even with reputable companies such as Google and Yahoo Search, many webmasters report that they do not match the clicks they paid for with the clicks their ad trackers report. When you have such concerns, be sure to bring them up as necessary, but the basic reason is typically that the visitor clicked on your ad but did not stick around long enough for your ad tracker to report it. This is frustrating but may not actually be fraud.

A well-monitored pay-per-click ad campaign can provide great returns, sometimes, 5-20 times what you have paid into it. Preventing click fraud is one of the ways you can ensure that you are maximizing your profit.

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