I think I have MFAs targeting my site

[makes a little sense]

I was wondering why over the last few weeks my earnings have dropped to around .50-.85 a day. I'm still somewhat a small website, but I was consistently making around $2-$5 a day. But I noticed a lot of discussion on MFAs has been present and I went ahead and did a preview filter. Sure enough, I already have 3 websites which are suspect.

Google, please do something about this. These people don't provide any helpful content to my website. I provide original content and would like people who click on my ads to go directly to that website to purchase the product.

Anyway, does anyone have some really great tips for removing these people? Is what I'm doing the only way (i.e, viewing the advertisers URL in the preview tool then entering in the base URL in the competitive ad filter page)?

Btw, I just found another MFA in the last two minutes. Ughhh. :(

[edited by: martinibuster at 5:29 am (utc) on Mar. 5, 2006]
[edit reason] Removed URLs. See TOS [webmasterworld.com] [/edit]

[Scurramunga]

I could easily comment on the above, however isn't it against TOS to be mentioning specific advertisers?

[dollarshort]

I would not block any site unless they are a serious competitor. More blocks = less earnings. Get real folks.

[dollarshort]

I am not an MFA, but if an MFA is willing to bid high to be displayed on your site, who cares as long as you are paid. It relates to the common sense theory "A bird in the hand is worth more than three in the bush".

[Scurramunga]

I can't see how an MFA would bid high if they are displaying google ads within the same niche - what kind of margin do they have if they carry the same advertisers that you do?

That's is food for thought even before you consider other issues such as your site's credibility, ethics etc

[makes a little sense]

dollarshort,

I don't want MFAs on my website, even if they do bid high. They confuse readers and the readers then get a negative impression about my site.

If it's not allowed to post the websites then someone please remove them as I cannot edit my post.

[maxgoldie]

They are a menace to the Internet. I believe that having these ads only decrease the credibility of Google ads to the average Net user. The end result of this cannot be a good thing.

Who wants to show ads on their site, that are of no use to their visitors?

[hunderdown]

dollarshort, the way AdWords works, you don't have to bid high to get your ad appearing in a top block.

Also, re this statement:

More blocks = less earnings.

Not necessarily true. If I remember correctly, Scurramunga, david_uk and Nitrous have posted about their experience of increasing their earnings by blocking MFAs, complete with a well argued rationale for why this would work.

Oh, and see the posts in this thread too:

[webmasterworld.com...]

[Key_Master]

MFA site ads are leaches that cut earnings across the board for publishers and severely limits ad exposures for legitimate companies.

In my opinion, the only viable solution to this problem is for Google to allow each publisher to set the minimum commission price per click/CPM on their sites.

And yes, removing MFA leaches raises earnings- sometimes substantially.

[roycerus]

You HAVE TO filter the MFA and no the MFA's don't fall inside the "more advertisers" category simply because they are not advertising a product but more advertisement with FALSE copy.
I don't see why Google does nothing about this. This is purely EVIL and goes completely against their corporate stand of "Do no evil" - Google needs to start a site by site review. Even if they just give 10 seconds of site review [per site] they will be able to weed out these advertisers.

[makes a little sense]

roycerus,

I agree. I've been to the sites and it takes less than 10secs to know if they are MFAs. It's so obvious it's not funny. And it's also not funny when my viewers click on the ads and go to these endless loop sites. Many viewers click several times on these sites because they are looking for more information but all these sites do is refer to other referrals.

[roycerus]

I had made a rather "loud" post a couple of days back about MFA's which the moderator rightfully removed but in that I had said how it makes MY website look bad when my visitors click on ads on my website and end up on a page with MORE ADS to MORE ADS. It just makes them trust the ads less and less. Which in turn hurts all of us cause suppose they land on your website the next day and see your ads - they just won't click.

I had recently asked one of friends to just take a look at one of my website pages and then asked him questions as to what he saw. He just didn't mention the ads - when later I showed him the section and asked him if he saw them - he said he did but knew they were ads and were of little use. When asked why he thought so he said - they are links to pages with more links.