Click Fraud Network

Ashkan Karbasfrooshan submitted an interesting article on Seeking Alpha.com related to the quality of ad traffics received from Made for Ads (MFA) and parked domain sites from GoClick.  Ashkan makes an interesting observation:

"Individually, sites like these did not send massive amounts of traffic, but cumulatively they did. According to my analysis... using a sample period, up to 40% of GoClick’s traffic came from such sites."

This observation holds true for most online advertisers - whether it is ad traffic from search networks or content networks. 

Advertisers must monitor and mitigate traffic received from all ad networks - whether it is from Google, Yahoo, MSN, GoClick, or others.

 
Click here to read the full story
 
 
 
 

Google does not consider clicks from Made for Ads site invalid clicks or click fraud - although a majority of MFA clicks do not convert and contain no valuable content.  You can mitigate the impact of these types of sites with Google's domain exclusion list feature.  As of January 2007, Google has removed the 500 site limit cap and now allows an unlimited number of sites on the exclusion list.

Using the free Click Fraud Network reports (the reports are free if you setup your site with page taqs - similar to web analytics provider javascript code on your pages - we can also process weblogs), you will see that individual MFA sites/domains provide your site with ad clicks and cumulatively will represent a significant portion of your clicks in the search and content networks.

How much of your advertising budget are you wasting on Made for Ads (MFA) sites?  Ready to find out?

It's simple, Click Here to get started today!
 

There's a reason that the majority of MFA sites do not convert. When executed properly, MFA sites can actually be just as converting as a user directly from the Google, MSN, or alike search network.

 The fact of the matter is that the majority of MFA site owners made sites that displayed ads based on very high paying keywords. For instance, "car insurance".

 Then these same people decided to go to Google Adwords and bid on keywords that were 10x or less expensive such as "cars" or even worse - "computers", which had really nothing to do with car insurance. Their hopes were that they'd pay $0.05 per click for low paying keywords, and they'd need at least 1 out of 100 of these to click a $5 ad in order to break even.

Well they definitely accomplished their mission. A 1% CTR is not hard to get even on completely unrelated set of ads. If they were to get 2 clicks out of 100, they'd in theory double their revenue (based on this example).

 MFA (or better known as Arbitrage) can be very conferting if done properly. Buying visitors for "free games" for $0.10 a click and redirecting to a page that displays ads for "free video games" at $0.50 a click can make you money and still keep the conversions high since the user is looking for the same relevant topic.

Big "MFA" companies still exist: ToSeekA.org, FindStuff.com, Shopica.com, etc. The reason is because they have millions of keyword data and know which keywords to bid on and which ads to display to show ads based on same relevant topic.

 So at the end of the day, there are only 2 ways to be in the "MFA" game and still send out converting traffic to advertisers.

 1) You bid on the same keywords and display ads for the same keywords.

2) You bid on different keywords that are within the same topic - but to do this you must have a lot of data and a lot of time to pick out the right keywords.

Marchex are frauds and commit CLICK FRUAD 2 Ways.  

One way they perform click fraud is explained here.......http://seekingalpha.com/article/36702-is-marchex-encouraging-click-fraud

The second way.....Marchex commits fraud is the good old fashion way, but simply lying.

I set up a landing page JUST for them, my reports say 4 clicks, their reports say 50 clicks.  I would understand if we were 30% off or 40% off, but that is crazy.   Marchex are liars.   

When I asked to see there logs, of MY CLICKS, that I am PAYING FOR.   They said.   "We dont give our click sources out" or ANY kind of click proof for that matter.    They said its....Company Policy.  Haaaaaa

"Its company policy" not to show me what I am paying for.  I just wish I could show more people how bad they were. Its not about using the wrong keyword, they are flat out LYING to people.  Thats my experience with Marchex.

I have the proof.   Marchex.....wont show me anything.  There should be true penalties for this. Maybe one day.