AAAA Releases Bulletin On Click Fraud

The American Association of Advertising Agencies has released a member bulletin focusing on the basic tenants of click fraud. One issue talked about in the bulletin was the definition of click fraud.

by Kristina Knight

The bulletin explained there is a difference between click fraud and poor quality clicks.

According to the Association, marketers and publishers generally see click fraud as intentionally clicking an ad with no intention of converting from browser to buyer. Marketers also see publishers getting a certain amount of revenue from clicks made through their sites as a form of click fraud. The American Association of Advertising Agencies define click fraud as “a person, automated script or computer program clicking on a paid search ad, adversely affecting the advertiser who received the click, often to the benefit of the publisher."

Most agree that fraudulent clicks should not be charged to the advertisers. The consensus on poor quality clicks, however, is not as clear. Poor quality clicks come from users who mistakenly click on an ad or don’t understand what clicking on the ad means.

Click fraud is estimated to cost U.S. businesses in excess of $1 billion each year.

Tags: click fraud, pay-per-click

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The billion dollar click fraud loss that search advertisers are incurring is the billion dollar gain of both the search engines and web publishers. When will significant instituions within in the advertising community such as the AAAA demand that new click fraud prevention measures be implemented at the major search engines? In its present form, SEM is a click fraud plagued system that requires advertisers to "throw away" a substantial percentage of their online advertising spend. How long will the major search engines be allowed to sweep the profitable click fraud problem under the rug?

Posted by: Jack Roberts on December 8, 2006 16:48

I totally agree with the research and conclusion of click fraud is hurting ad budgets. Many search engines did not make it clear that customer must complain within 30 days for credit. They make contact with customer service very difficult and pocket the ill gotten profits at the expense of honest advertisers. This in the long end hurts everyone, customer, reputation this mode of advertisement. The FTC lawsuit against Google does not address these problems fairly.

Posted by: Alex Height on December 9, 2006 04:47

Posted by: Alex Height on December 9, 2006 04:48

Click fraud is a problem, but in many cases, it's manageable. There are a number of click fraud detection companies that have sprung up - I myself use ClickProtector (www.clickprotector.com). These sites not only find click fraud but they can also attempt to deter it by popping up warning messages to the violator. Since we implemented it our fraud hasn't gone away but it has definitely declined - plus we now have knowledge of how much these fake clicks are costing us and can build it into our marketing budget.

Posted by: Jim Turndale on December 14, 2006 21:19