werty - 5:56 am on Apr 11, 2009 (gmt 0)

Will using the new "local targeting" actually prevent our ads from being served overseas? Or is it just another feature to get the attention off the terrible quality traffic of the "Yahoo! Search Partners"?

Currently we are using "North American YSM" and should only be getting North American traffic, but if I look through our logs I can see that 29% of the traffic is coming from foreign countries.

I could see how maybe 2-3% could come from proxies or things like that, but this traffic is highly suspect.

This month we have had 2061 Yahoo! clicks being reported in our logs, with the breakdown of traffic being:

Country - Clicks - %
United States - 1156 - 56.14%
India - 200 - 9.71%
Canada - 186 - 9.03%
Mexico - 117 - 5.68%
Germany - 54 - 2.62%
Indonesia - 32 - 1.55%
Malaysia - 23 - 1.12%
Italy - 15 - 0.73%
Guatemala - 14 - 0.68%
Puerto Rico - 14 - 0.68%
Pakistan - 11 - 0.53%
United Kingdom - 11 - 0.53%
China - 10 - 0.49%
Korea, Republic of10 - 0.49%
Poland - 10 - 0.49%
Vietnam - 10 - 0.49%
Bangladesh - 8 - 0.39%
Greece - 8 - 0.39%
Dominican Republic7 - 0.34%
Serbia - 7 - 0.34%
Argentina - 6 - 0.29%
Switzerland - 6 - 0.29%
Thailand - 6 - 0.29%
Trinidad and Tobago6 - 0.29%
Australia - 5 - 0.24%
Chile - 5 - 0.24%
Kuwait - 5 - 0.24%
Nigeria - 5 - 0.24%
Satellite Provider5 - 0.24%
Spain - 5 - 0.24%
France - 4 - 0.19%
Jamaica - 4 - 0.19%
Lebanon - 4 - 0.19%
Philippines - 4 - 0.19%
Syrian Arab Republic4 - 0.19%
Turkey - 4 - 0.19%
Venezuela - 4 - 0.19%
Costa Rica - 3 - 0.15%
Hungary - 3 - 0.15%
Ireland - 3 - 0.15%
Morocco - 3 - 0.15%
Norway - 3 - 0.15%
Russian Federation3 - 0.15%
Sweden - 3 - 0.15%
Taiwan - 3 - 0.15%
Algeria - 2 - 0.10%
Algeria - 2 - 0.10%
Belgium - 2 - 0.10%
Brazil - 2 - 0.10%
Brunei Darussalam2 - 0.10%
Bulgaria - 2 - 0.10%
Colombia - 2 - 0.10%
El Salvador - 2 - 0.10%
Lithuania - 2 - 0.10%
Netherlands Antilles2 - 0.10%
Nicaragua - 2 - 0.10%
Portugal - 2 - 0.10%
South Africa - 2 - 0.10%
Ukraine - 2 - 0.10%
Aruba - 1 - 0.05%
Bahamas - 1 - 0.05%
Cameroon - 1 - 0.05%
Cayman Islands - 1 - 0.05%
Croatia - 1 - 0.05%
Egypt - 1 - 0.05%
Ethiopia - 1 - 0.05%
Ghana - 1 - 0.05%
Guyana - 1 - 0.05%
Haiti - 1 - 0.05%
Honduras - 1 - 0.05%
Iraq - 1 - 0.05%
Israel - 1 - 0.05%
Japan - 1 - 0.05%
Kenya - 1 - 0.05%
Monaco - 1 - 0.05%
Nepal - 1 - 0.05%
New Zealand - 1 - 0.05%
Panama - 1 - 0.05%
Romania - 1 - 0.05%
Singapore - 1 - 0.05%
Sri Lanka - 1 - 0.05%
Tanzania, United Republic of - 1 - 0.05%
Uganda - 1 - 0.05%

Of those 2061 that we received we were billed for 1894. This is roughly 8% of "bad traffic" that is being caught or screened by Yahoo!

There is another 21% that is not being caught, screened or refunded.

The scariest/funniest part of this is; Of the 2061 clicks, only 43 came from Yahoo! or ca.search.yahoo.com. That is 2.1% of traffic we received or 2.3% of traffic we paid for.