Google Downplays Third-Party Click Fraud Estimates
Google claims it has discovered some key flaws in the way that third-party research firms have been estimating click fraud statistics, and as a result, the dire click fraud numbers we’ve all been seeing are exaggerated. Apparently, third-party click fraud reports record data from what Google calls “fictitious clicks,” clicks that are reported as fraudulent, but never get detected or charged by Google.
“We have seen some instances of reports showing 1.5 times the number of clicks in our logs – for example, in one case 1,278 clicks were claimed as being “fraudulent†by the consultant while only 850 actually even appeared as clicks in GoogleÂ’s logs,” wrote a member of the Google AdWords team on the official AdWords blog.
Google says that many research companies don’t count actual clicks, but estimate the number of clicks by other factors like the number of repeated page loads, which can simply be the result of a user hitting the back button on their browser or visiting the advertiser’s site multiple times. Google also says that research companies that use cookies to track users may actually attribute clicks that are made on ads for one network to another. In other words, if a user clicks on a Yahoo ad, the click may be attributed to a click on a Google ad.
For the report, Google examined three auditing firms that represented reports sent to it by advertisers: AdWatcher, ClickFacts, and Click Forensics. Google said it would work with click auditing firms to help make their reports more accurate.
Reader Comments.
- Pingback from T. Longren » Google’s Click Fraud Analysis
It will not really change things anyways.
Leave a Comment
Article Sponsor
More News
Features
- Automakers Need to Become Better Conversationalists July 2nd 2009
- Affiliates can win in the media buy game July 2nd 2009
- Crowd-Sourced Ads: A Measured Response June 28th 2009
- Is the government coming for you? June 28th 2009
- Customer Loyalty: How to Earn It June 25th 2009
-
Loading ...
Latest News
- Readers weigh in on ATT, ad networks and the iPhone July 2nd 2009 ADOTAS — In our weekly poll, readers overwhelmingly said that [...] more »
- Hiring, promotions, location, partnerships and product news July 2nd 2009 ADOTAS — Internet Oldtimers Foundation, Jumptap, eXelate, Kampyle, The Digital [...] more »
- OPA large ad units unfurl across the web July 1st 2009 ADOTAS — The Online Publishers Association said a group of [...] more »
- Email spam in June worst since 2007 July 1st 2009 ADOTAS — MessageLabs Intelligence released its numbers for June, and [...] more »
- Joost becomes YouTube roadkill, starts layoffs July 1st 2009 ADOTAS — Despite reworking its technology to work in a [...] more »
- Ad networks, not websites, choked on Michael Jackson news July 1st 2009 ADOTAS — The news of the pop star’s death saw [...] more »
- StrongMail doubling down on social media, buys PopularMedia July 1st 2009 ADOTAS — StrongMail has announced that it acquired PopularMedia, a [...] more »
Spotlight
Trust Me – I’m a Professional … SEOADOTAS — At WebMetro we typically provide SEO Action Plans as part of campaigns. As the name implies, an SEO [...] more...
Reader Favorites
Layoff Tracker
- AOL - 700
- Apple - 50
- Clear Channel - 2,800 total (1,000 currently)
- Google - 340
- IBM - more than 7,800
- Joost - about 90
- MySpace - in June, about 720
- World Avenue - 30 percent of workforce
- Yahoo - 2,220 total, about 700 currently
- Zango - closes, about 90, in addition to earlier layoffs
Classifieds
Recent Comments
- Josette Davids: Great article and an amazing time was had by all at this event. I'm an
- Mike Poserina: There is also a tragic flaw rumored in Bing's ad placement engine. When resolved,
- Andy: Erin, Never mind the commenters who can only see the negative side of things. I thank you
- pkohler: We've also noticed that ads frequently adversely affects the performance of a Web page. As
