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Google Releases Analysis of Click-Fraud Detection
fragmentate writes "This morning Google released information about their analysis of the exaggerated click-fraud numbers. Without pointing fingers, they mention that click-fraud analysis companies need to clean up their methods. From the post, 'A rigorous technical analysis by Google engineers has found fundamental flaws in the work of several click fraud consultants - flaws that help explain why widely quoted estimates of the size of the click fraud problem are exaggerated.' They even point out some obvious shortcomings of the methods used. The entire report [PDF] is available with their complete analysis."
In this case, it sounds like some are crying "click fraud" in order to pay less for the clicks their ads generate. If they can claim large amounts of fraudulent clicks, they pay less to Google.
Sure click fraud exists, but I imagine these "consultants" are advertising themselves as a way to pay Google less, while still having a high volume ad campaign. Taken to the logical extreme, any click-through that doesn't result in a sale was a fraudulent one.
Google Search: 3.5%
Google adsense: 0.25%
This is what kills me. Companies are so willing to fork over a ton of money for cost-per-click (CPC) advertising, when so many sites are not friendly to search engine spiders for organic (non-paid) searches. It's one of the biggest, and most overlooked reasons to use standards-based design practices. And it's free to do so (at least, if it's done the first time)!
In many cases, CPC advertising is another example of throwing money at a problem for a band-aid.
It amazes me anyone would pay any attention to them in the first place.
Google has a great solution for that. If the transaction is online, you can embed a small piece of HTML/Javascript code in your 'thank you for purchasing' page that allows Google to check the value of a cookie they placed on a customer's computer when they clicked an ad.
The cookie links the click to the sale. And there is value to the advertiser as well: Google can then help you track which ad resulted in a sale, and which keywords it was linked to. (So you don't have to buy an expensive but poor-return keyword.)
(I may be mis-describing: Check Google's docs to be sure.)
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If quotas exist, whether set by man or machine, mechanisms will eventually appear to ensure that quotas are met.
If Software X must discover Y amount of fradulent clicks, then there will eventually be a means that makes certain that Y amount of fradulent clicks are discovered.
For Google, how much of the budget depends on discovering X number or Y percent of fraudulent clicks?
For Microsoft, how many pirated copies of Windows must be discovered each day/week/month/whatever?
The hypothesis may apply in other cases. How much of a town's civic budget depends on income from traffic violations? What happens if traffic violations fail to raise that revenue?
Look for quotas. Sometimes the numbers are the answer.
Unfortunately this is not true with pay-per-click, which is where google makes 99% of their income. At the end of a day in reality, you are paying for CLICKS. The question is are those clicks generated by humans, or by scripts, or by people trying to rip you off.
I often hear the same stupid analogy: "Click fraud is no different than getting up to go pee during a commercial break and not watching the commercials, or tivo'ing through them in fast forward."
WRONG. With clickfraud, you can make REAL, ACTUAL, CASH. I defy you to give an example of how someone can make REAL, ACTUAL, CASH by going to the bathroom during a commercial.
Face it- Google will never end the controversy until they have third party auditing. Right now, all they have is "trust us". Guess what- there's no other advertising industry on earth where "trust us" is good enough. They ALL have auditing by independent parties. Cuz guess what? Businesses will try and rip each other off if they know they won't be caught. Google has already proved they are perfectly willing to rip off advertisers since they ADMITTED they have been charging people for "doubleclicks" for YEARS, even though they knew all those clicks were invalid because they came from the same IP/cookie and happened within 1/4 second of each other.
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At the end of the day, you're paying me for access to my readers' eyeballs. If your product is irrelevant, overpriced or otherwise not useful to my readers, or you lack the marketing skills to gain their interest with your ad, why should I be forced to let you off the hook on paying me? You still ran your ad on my site...
Interesting, but wouldn't it make more sense to have a neutral party do the analysis instead of Google, whose bulk of the revenue comes from those same clicks they analyzed? Having Google do the analysis and reporting is like having Microsoft do Vista benchmarking. That is, if Vista were actually ready.
Simpy
.... for taking these "analysts" to task with some facts, and publically. Many companies would have just deferred to presenting it all in a libel lawsuit.
Is click fraud an issue? Certainly.
However, these companies purporting to provide analysis and actually providing nonsense are just as guilty of defrauding the advertisers as the click fraudsters they purport to guard against.