Insight into Google click fraud detection

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http://googleblog.blogspot.com/pdf/Tuzhilin_Report.pdf

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SES Conference in San Jose, California yields response from Google and Yahoo regarding Click Fraud Auditing.......


San Jose, California held the Search Engine Strategies Conference last week. In one forum, the companies who provide click-fraud auditing went head to head with Google's Click Quality Team. Google claims that these companies are reporting much higher percentages of click fraud than they believe is realistic and were strong to attack the accuracy of these firms who provide click fraud auditing. Google released a 17 page report stating that outside firms are flawed and misleading. In this report Google states the following:
"We have continued to see third-party click fraud auditing firms stating that their measurements show much higher levels of click-fraud than we believe could possibly be realistic,'' says the report, referring to estimates of 14%. "Although only a very small number of AdWords advertisers use third-party click fraud auditing firms, the click fraud estimates produced by these firms have been highly publicized and caused concern for many advertisers. We also receive click fraud auditing reports generated by these firms requesting refunds.''

The real issue regarding click fraud or invalid clicks is providing an industry standard of definitions. Third party vendors are a necessity in detecting invalid clicks and click fraud. These companies who have the ability to detect and identify invalid clicks, such as Hitslink, have no vested interest in ad revenue and who's business model is based on being able to detect possible anomalies within a website's traffic statistics. There is complete transparency in seeing the traffic to your website as they are designed to help with your website promotion and marketing efforts.

The forum last week has intensified an already heated debate between the search engines and the click fraud auditing companies. At the end of the day, it is the ultimate responsibility of the consumer to monitor and assess traffic and campaigns. Using statisics software like Hitslink allows you to stay on top of your campaigns and monitor them successfully. It is important to have checks and balances and since search engines do not provide all of the information needed to validate clicks or invalidate clicks, third party tracking and monitoring is a necessity. As the debate continues, Google, Yahoo and Ask have agreed to work with the Interactive Advertising Bureau to write click fraud prevention guidelines as well as create standards on how to identify click fraud and how to define a "click". There is hope for an industry wide standard but until then, the fight goes on and the need for tracking your website statistics is a necessity in monitoring your pay per click ads successfully!