2 Things That Could Make Your Business a Big Click Fraud Target
Whether you call it click fraud, ad fraud, pay-per-click fraud or something else entirely, the crime itself costs online advertisers tens of billions of dollars every year. One recent estimate suggests that it won’t be long before annual losses eclipse $100 billion. As an advertiser, what can you do to stop it? A good starting place is understanding what could make your business an attractive target.
Certain types of industries are a bit more susceptible to click fraud than others. That greater susceptibility is based on two things:
- Traffic volume
- Keyword cost-per-click.
Both factors are discussed in more detail below. As you read, consider the possibility of investing in click fraud protection services or a software package that will help you fight click fraud yourself. Fraud Blocker would be a good choice to look into.
Scammers Love Traffic
According to Fraud Blocker, click fraud susceptibility is partially related to traffic volume. The simplest way to put it is to say that scammers love traffic. The higher the volume, the more opportunities there are to generate fake clicks and impressions. It follows that higher traffic volume leads to higher click fraud revenues.
High traffic also benefits fraudsters by making it easier for them to conceal their activities. Think of it in terms of walking down a busy Manhattan street. You could be dressed in a Santa Claus suit and still be difficult to spot from the air in the midst of rush hour traffic. You get lost in the sea of people moving back and forth. But wear that same suit on a lightly traveled street in small-town America and you’re easy to spot.
Click fraud perpetrators do whatever they can to conceal their actions. High traffic volumes are attractive for that reason. Not only does more traffic create more opportunities to generate fake clicks, but it also makes the task of disguising fake clicks (to make them look legitimate) a lot easier.
Scammers Love Expensive Keywords
The other factor in click fraud susceptibility is the cost-per click of an advertiser’s keywords. Understanding this component requires understanding how pay-per-click (PPC) advertising works. The PPC model is based on bids and auctions.
An advertiser decides on the keywords to be used for a particular ad campaign. Bids are then placed on those keywords to determine how often the advertiser’s ads are displayed. The higher the bid, the more displays an advertiser gets. As you might expect, some keywords are more expensive than others.
The legal industry is well known for its expensive keywords. Something like ‘DUI attorney’ could command bid prices as high as $100 per click. That is an attractive amount of money to a click fraud perpetrator. Every fake click he can generate on ads utilizing that particular keyword puts $100 in his pocket.
Traffic Influences Keyword Bids
Interestingly enough, the value of the keywords in a particular industry is often influenced by traffic volume. Online retail is a good example. It is an industry that generates a tremendous amount of traffic by its very nature. Therefore, the most competitive keywords in retail are almost always the most expensive across the entire online ecosystem.
The take-away here is that your company could be more susceptible to click fraud than others if you operate in a high-volume industry with expensive keywords. But being more susceptible doesn’t mean your company has to accept being victimized. Between click fraud protection software and old-fashioned sleuthing by experienced IT security professionals, click fraud can be identified and stopped. You just need to have the will and resources to go after it.
