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Citysearch.com is defrauding its advertising customers of millions of dollars by not only turning a blind eye to click fraud, but in fact encouraging it as well, according to a lawsuit filed today in Los Angeles Superior Court by Kabateck Brown Kellner, LLP."Most click fraud cases involve companies that simply turn a blind eye to it," said the victims' attorney, Brian S. Kabateck, Managing Partner of Kabateck Brown Kellner. "Citysearch does this too, since it has no real program to prevent click fraud. But Citysearch goes beyond indifference to actively incentivizing click fraud. Citysearch's motive is simple: clicks equal cash, whether they're fraudulent or not."
Citysearch Sued for Click Fraud [foxbusiness.com]
[edited by: engine at 8:31 am (utc) on May 28, 2008]
[edit reason] fair use and link added [/edit]
Click fraud can be detected by software that can track suspicious patterns, such as repeated clicks from the same source. Although Citysearch assures its customers that it applies this technology, the experiences of many of its customers shows otherwise, according to the suit. Still, customers are led to believe that Citysearch is in fact actively fighting against click fraud.
Citysearch...pays commissions to its salespeople based on the number of clicks their customers' ads receive, providing an incentive for click fraud, according to the lawsuit.
Can't really think of another way to base a salespersons commission on other than account revenue. Are there other models used in PPC sales?
I guess it is not about the model but the rules within the model. I guess Google/Yahoo!/etc. do not offer incentives for reps to click on clients' ads.
Seems like that's something out of their control.
but how can the salesmen increase the clicks on a customers ads?
but how can the salesmen increase the clicks on a customers ads?By clicking on them?
And...
Asking their friends and family to click on them.
Hiring one those "100,000 visitors to your site" services.
Running a click bot.
Hiring one those "100,000 visitors to your site" services.
Still, what other models of salesperson comp are there in the PPC arena?
Citysearch...pays commissions to its salespeople based on the number of clicks their customers' ads receive, providing an incentive for click fraud, according to the lawsuit.
Can't really think of another way to base a salespersons commission on other than account revenue. Are there other models used in PPC sales?
IP is the hard one, but if you can fake the above
You can't fake an IP with a clickbot: TCP/IP just doesn't work that way. You can only use IPs under your control, and to produce pseudo-random results you'd need quite a few (i.e. a botnet) to avoid easy detection.
