Google On Click Fraud: “Talk to the hand”

• November 17th, 2006 /
•  Blake Killian

A few weeks ago, we got really serious about click fraud. We do a lot of search marketing (PPC) and grew suspicious of click fraud as we implemented a new strategy. After evaluating a number of services, we decided to “advertise smarter” with AdWatcher.

We ran AdWatcher on one campaign in Google Adwords for a week, and after five days AdWatcher alerted us to over a thousand (1209) fraudulent clicks from 11/6-11/10. That Friday I sent Google the report through their Adwords support system.

This past Tuesday I got an answer from Adwords. Here’s a bit of the e-mail they sent me:

After a thorough investigation, our team was unable to verify much of the activity in your click tracking report. As an example, our server records show only two clicks for IP 68.58.163.163 (at 15:34 and 15:39 ET) on your ads, whereas the report indicates 24 clicks between 15:39 and 15:40 on November 6th. For other IP addresses on November 6th, our data also shows significantly fewer clicks than your tracking report.

To understand the source of these discrepancies, our team recently analyzed the tracking mechanisms for various third party click auditing software, including AdWatcher. The results were surprising- these programs appear to cite fictitious clicks that do not appear on Google server records.

For AdWatcher, we noted that their tracking appears dependant on a frequency count stored on a browser cookie. Our analysis found that this count can increment for clicks on different advertisers and advertising networks. Although an IP address may have registered only 1 click on your ad, AdWatcher may report the total count.

At this point, I know I want to get someone on the phone, but before I did, I wanted to give AdWatcher a chance to respond. Here’s what they told me this morning:

We are aware of their report, unfortunately when we tried to replicate their tests we did not reach the same conclusion. In my opinion they are describing situations which are not likely to occur in a real life scenario.

I was relieved to see AdWatcher standing by their product, and they said that they are releasing an update later this month to crack down on Google’s choke-hold. But this stuff isn’t rocket science. If, within 60 seconds, one of our ads get clicked over 20 times, I highly doubt this is normal behavior. But back to Google.

I found a number online (THE GOOGLE ADWORDS SUPPORT NUMBER IS 1-866-246-6453), and called Adwords. I’ll preface this by saying that Google was never snide, cocky or arrogant, and in fact it was their indifference that frustrated me the most. The guy answers and I tell him I’m calling to talk to someone about click fraud. I told him about installing AdWatcher, getting some suspicious clicks and submitting the report to Google. I also told him about the results from the Google investigation.

I’m not married to AdWatcher (or at least I wasn’t at the time, they’ve earned some points with me), so I asked the Google guy what third party tracking software they recommend, and he said “none of them.” He then went into a speech about how Google takes click fraud very seriously, and has teams constantly working to filter results in an effort to address the problem. I told him that I respected Google, but wasn’t willing to take their word for it.

Google is working internally to “fight” click fraud he said, but there have been other companies who have tracked fraud and received refunds I said. So I asked him if Google is finding this information internally, and then granting automatic refunds when they find it, and he said, “oh, no sir, that’s not how it works. You have to report that to us before we can take any action.” I’m right back where I started.

At this point, Google basically told me to talk to the hand. They are all powerful and don’t really have to worry about me. Maybe in their universe of advertisers, I am small, but I know how much we spend on a monthly basis, and it’s certainly not nothing. This really gets me thinking about how much Google relies on ad revenues, and makes me question how many of those revenues are earned legitimately.

I am currently working to get some help for the little guy. I am trying to contact a friend at Click Tracks to answer some questions I have about click fraud, and about approaching Google. I will also update about the progress I make with AdWatcher. If you’ve had some success getting validation from Google, let us know. We’re looking for help, and would appreciate anything anybody could offer. I don’t want this to sound like I’m complaining, because that’s not what this is. This is just my call for an audit of Google’s internal systems, and some checks and balances.

Bottom line, if Google is serious about combating click fraud, why would they have a problem encouraging users to use third-party tracking software. They’re asking for our trust, but why make us so suspicious?

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