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Click Fraud Percentages
Neither Google, Overture nor any other search engine has been willing to publish click fraud rates for their paid advertising program. Hints have been provided regarding a rate of 20 percent. Active advertisers know, however,
percentages can be much higher depending on competitiveness of keywords in question. Click Defense, Plaintiff in lawsuit, is claiming a click fraud rate of 38 percent.
Will This Impact PPC?
The lawsuit against Google was inevitable. Every site using Adwords is aware of problem with click fraud. Frankly, it is a problem with every pay-per-click search engine although our experience has been better with Overture.
So, will this lawsuit force search engines to clean up their act? It’s hard to say, but there should be one definite benefit. As part of lawsuit, Google may be forced to reveal true click fraud percentages occurring in Adwords. If Google moves to quickly settle case, you should take it as an indication it wants to keep rates confidential. This, of course, will mean click fraud percentages are high.
You should watch progress of this lawsuit if you use pay-per-click search engines to promote your site. Some very interesting information should be revealed. Regardless of outcome, click fraud is just another reason to pursue search engine optimization strategies.
Halstatt Pires is with Marketing Titan- an Internet marketing and advertising company comprised of a search engine optimization specialist providing meta tag optimization services and Internet marketing consultant providing internet marketing solutions through integrated design and programming services.
