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Some bright spark has clearly got around Overture's click happy systems checking. The question is whether Overture are going to refund it.
What's your money on guys? Refund, Rejection or no decision for over a month?
I'll keep you posted, with a free link drawn from a hat if you guess right.
What I would suggest you do is look at the source of the extra clicks in your logs and if there was very high volume from one source then you will know what's up. These high volumes never produced any decent traffic - most were "fly by" visitors who often didn't even wait for the page to load. Not, IMHO, proper SEARCH traffic.
Did your impressions for this term also increase?
Did your impressions for this term also increase?
Oh, certainly they did - because we bid so high, but it was the percentage click through rate that astounded me. 35% aginst 3-5% on average. Now - before I upset too many people - I am NOT blaming Overture, as I know their checks to be amongst the most rigourous in the industry, but I AM blaming a rather crafty SEO who seems to have tried to abuse the system...
Our tracking was server side, and it looks like there wasn't time for the page to load to get a good look at the referrer, so I may need to dust off Webtrends.
What's your money on guys? Refund, Rejection or no decision for over a month?
Refund ;)
Its this sort of thing that can make a nonsence out of PPC.
We have been in exactly the same situation three times in the last few months. We report our findings to Overture and are told they have "...found no evidence of any unusual activity."
This is the number of clicks per day column in my Overture report.
0
0
0
1
1
0
0
0
1
0
0
3
0
0
1
1
0
0
1
0
1
0
1
0
1
1
0
0
0
0
0
103
0
Can you spot the odd day out? - Overture can't.
Also, I feel such a hypocrite when I reassure my clients when they worry about competitors clicking on their ads.
It is not in Overtures interest to make £££ out of Fraudulent activity.
Only advice I can give is to have as much data as possible, and keep stressing your overture contact about this :)
On another note I have heard that certain investigations can take slightly longer, especially if a # of advertisers "may" have been hit in the same industry.
Receptional and Serio I hope your matters are resolved ASAP...
Shak
Thanks also to Overture staff who worked to isolate and resolve the issue.
Dixon.
Glad to see you back as a happy man :)
Shak
not being defensive of Overture here, but in a meeting earlier this week, totally unrelated to your query.
an Overture UK staff member went out of their way to find me, and tell me about what was being done to solve your situation, they specifically mentuioned your "screen name"
saying oh dear simply aint good enough...
Shak
sorry to rant, but 1 person has actually spent a lot of their very valuable time at OV trying to get this solved.
Have you got any feedback from Overture yet? If so, what was the outcome? From what I can tell, Overture have not only sorted my financial loss out but (more importantly) seem to have plugged the loophole that was being exploited as well, preventing others from doing this kind of thing in the future - which must have been a MUCH bigger task for them than just a refund, so my comgratulations to Overture for a "proper fix" frm my perspective.
What has happened with you Serio?
Dixon.
You say they "seem to have plugged the loophole that was being exploited" - sounds like good news - can you expand on that at all please.
Dixon.
