How to Avoid Click Fraud In Your PPC Campaigns

By Barbara Mesar

Click fraud is an ever increasing problem in the search engine marketing industry and can be detrimental or even fatal to a PPC campaign. Click fraud, simply, is when a person, automated script, or computer program imitates a legitimate user of a web browser clicking on an ad, for the purpose of generating a charge per click without having actual interest in the target of the ad's link.

There are many reasons why click fraud occurs. It may be a competitor clicking on a rival to deplete their online advertising budget quicker than usual. Other times it's someone from an affiliate site that hosts search-engine ads and receives a small commission for every click. It could be a team of users clicking repeatedly on an ad. Or, most commonly, the fraudulent clicks are automated by "hitbot" software.

There are a number of practical things that you can do to avoid being hit hard by click fraud.

A. The major search engines such as Google are active in fighting click fraud and have set up whole teams with a specific purpose to fight click fraud. Avoid advertising on small search engines who do not have a click fraud refund policy or who do not have measures in place to investigate any claims you may need to make with them.

Stick to advertising with the major players such as Google, MSN and Yahoo! as you will be better protected and supported if a click fraud problem occurs to your campaign.

B. Analyse your website data and identify if you are getting a large amount of clicks from one certain IP address. If you have seen a dramatic increase in clicks for your ad but have not seen a relevant increase in conversions also then you may have some reason to believe that your account is subject to click fraud.

C. Try to see of you can identify click patterns for your ads. Are there a large amount of clicks for your ad occurring at the same time each day or hour? If so then are all the clicks coming from the same IP address. If they are then it may be worth investigating further with the search engine you are advertising with.

D. If you believe that click fraud has occurred on your ads notify the search engine you are advertising with. Google for example will investigate your claim and if found that you have been the receiver of fraudulent clickism, your account will be credited.

Click fraud is an area of PPC advertising that advertisers should make themselves aware of as you will make yourself better able to protect your advertising budget and accurate results.