Forum Moderators: martinibuster
I've heard other people mention getting banned after running ad campaigns through one of Marchex's networks, but I never really took it seriously until now. I think Google needs to step up and finally address this issue, before other unsuspecting webmasters find themselves in the same situation. Are these second tier ppc networks frowned upon by Google AdSense? Should webmasters remove the adsense ads before running these types of ad campaigns, specifically Marchex's network traffic [GoClick & Enhance]? I'm really hoping this can be clarified by Google.
[edited by: BlueLeaf at 8:25 pm (utc) on Nov. 14, 2006]
"Prohibited Clicks and Impressions- Any method that artificially generates clicks or impressions is strictly prohibited. These prohibited methods include but are not limited to: repeated manual clicks or impressions, incentives to click or to generate impressions, using robots, automated click and impression generating tools, third-party services that generate clicks or impressions such as paid-to-click, paid-to-surf, autosurf, and click-exchange programs, or any deceptive software. Please note that clicking on your own ads for any reason is prohibited, to avoid potential inflation of advertiser costs."
I suggest you stop using the service and contact google to see if you can get reinstated. But you will have to tell them you made an honest mistake because your new and see if they will forgive you.
[edited by: BlueLeaf at 12:50 pm (utc) on Nov. 15, 2006]
you can not by clicks or impressions from a third party
It's not the buying itself that Google has an issue with, most advertising is done to "buy traffic". But when you do buy traffic it becomes your responsibility to ensure that it's "clean". When the traffic seller violates Adsense TOS it is seen as you violating them.
I've been running an ad campaign with GoClick.
The real issue here is that 99% of the traffic coming from GoClick's distribution network is of "get-paid-to-click" type (or totally artificial)! That's why you are in direct violation of AdSense TOS.
Go daddy traffic is mostly bot driven or paid to surf type of traffic.
For the last several days I've been running an ad campaign with GoClick
Can you specify exactly how long your GC campaing has been running?
What was your maximum bid on keywords you bought in GC?
How much traffic were you buying?
How long have you had your account with AS?
How many other sites do you have running AS?
Do you personally know anyone who has ever been banned for any reason?
I have been running GC campaings for at least 6 months. I do the same thing you did over and over again. As soon as I put up a new site, I buy traffic through GC and sometimes others to get instant traffic until it gets indexed and natural traffic comes along. If I get a positive ROI, I continue to buy extra traffic even after natural traffic has kicked in.
As far as GC goes, I have noticed one thing in paricular. If I have a High Positive ROI and I decide to raise my bids, traffic sometimes shoots up and my ROI drops down to the gutter. It is obvious that raising my bid would reduce my ROI, but not in the proportion that it does. I have deduced that once I cross a certain price point, I become a target for click fraud. I then either dump that keyword or reduce the bid and the ROI returns to normal.
On the subject of click fraud and GC... It's a fact of life that fraud does happen and will happen in pretty much every industry. Fraud is a side effect of greed. I understand why and how someone would commit fraud through GC artificially inflating the amount of clicks you will pay for. This would equal extra $$$ for the fraudulent clickster from GC. What I don't understand is Why or How someone who is commiting click fraud through GC or any other 3rd party PPC would profit by clicking your AS ads. Anyone care to explain this last one?
As I mentioned, I have heard of people getting banned from AdSense after using one of Marchex's networks, unfortunately I didn't take those stories as serious as I should have.
Last night I did some more investigating of my traffic logs, and noticed that a lot of the traffic referrals came from spyware / adware landing pages. Obviously that's enough for Google to ban me right on the spot, and I can't blame them for it. I wasn't aware that GoClick delivered this sort of traffic. To really top off the frustration that I'm experiencing, GoClick only delivered about 50% of the traffic I was billed for. It's seems they hit me below the belt twice.
I have contacted them, they seem to pass of the entire blame on to their "network partners". How does a company like Marchex / GoClick continue to operate within the confines of US law, if they are indeed sending artificial traffic to websites, this is fraud, regardless of whether or not their partner sites have anything to do with it. The bottom line is they are billing webmasters for this traffic, not their partner sites. You would think some where along the line, this company would be held accountable for defrauding webmasters. I obviously feel naive that I wasn't fully aware that this sort of thing was occuring at GoClick, as the general consensus seems to be that they are defrauding people, and have been doing so for quite some time.
Google obviously knows exactly what the issue was with GoClick's traffic, whether it's bots, or human clickers. It's too bad I can't get access to that information, as I'm sure it would make the basis of an extremely strong case against Marchex.
[edited by: BlueLeaf at 2:27 pm (utc) on Nov. 15, 2006]
