Major Search Engine PPC and Ad Network Biz Models – Is It a Racket?

[ad_1]

Ok let’s think about this for a second! If you’re not into SEO or a Spammer then you are pretty much at the mercy of major PPC’s and other Ad Networks to provide web traffic to your sites.

And here is how it works.

1. We pull out our credit card and pay ‘upfront’ for web traffic that we cannot see, touch or confirm. Basically our money is being held by the Seller/Traffic Provider to spend once traffic is delivered. Millions if not billions of dollars are being uploaded to advertisers accounts and we are to ‘trust’ that the PPC search engine or Ad Network is spending our money ‘honestly’!?

This is the most ridiculous assumption that we all grudgingly accept daily.

Why is it this way?

Because those who were first in line that have acquired the most traffic made up all the rules and terms! Which are extremely one-sided and in favor of the traffic providers.

We fully understand that 10 years ago technology moved fast on the net and business models were created on the fly to accommodate demand. But 10 years later these same unfair business models and practices are reaping billions without considering the best interests of advertisers.

“In the real world no one pays ‘full’ upfront fees for services and/or products rendered for very good reasons. Any wise business person will use an escrow. And no seasoned business person would allow sellers to solely determine and deduct revenues earned from seller-controlled deposits without the buyer/advertiser being able to reconcile, confirm delivery and quality of those products or services stringently.”

It seems most get caught up in the fear of loss, hope of gain mentality and lose the sense of basic business principals.

It gets worse. How could the buyer/advertiser even reconcile numbers since they never see an IP address of a visitor (that they paid for) ‘recorded by the seller’?

I mean we really don’t have a choice who tracks the visitor’s do we? Why can’t the advertiser/buyer track and determine all the visitors and the sellers deduct our money from our deposits based on the advertisers tracking numbers? Aren’t we just as capable and honest as the Sellers? Ridiculous huh and why there is a need for a third-party click fraud auditing and tracking system that represents the best interests of both parties.

This is a ‘Major Conflict of Interest’ in the real brick and mortar world that has gone seemingly undisputed for over 10 years.

Again the same company who is holding our money is also counting the clicks/impressions and deducting money from our upfront deposits without any means of reconciliation?

They determine a real or fraudulent visitor and are supposedly representing our best interests when they are a for-profit business!? And to add more insult to the injury major PPC search engine/Ad Networks tracking systems only record visitor counts and how much money we owe them.

Here is an example of a major online search engine that is making a fortune from PPC Ads: 20 clicks /1000 impressions – $20.00

That’s it!?

There is a ton of information on how to find keywords, optimization and creating accounts (blah blah) but when it comes to how much we owe them we get the least amount of information possible.

And lets not forget that major PPC’s search engines do not provide any record of IP’s whatsoever. How can you the advertiser possibly determine if a visitor is legitimate if you cannot track and confirm ‘Seller Recorded’ IP’s? Heck lets just take their word for it. If they say it’s real and legit then they must be right? Wrong.

If they want to track all the clicks AND track revenues owed – at the very least provide the ‘paying’ advertiser with IP’s addresses.

There are 1000’s of ways to spam and to commit online fraud. We are not advocating that the major PPC’s or Ad networks are blatantly committing fraud. We are saying that there are tons of ways the major search engine PPC & Ad Networks ‘cannot detect click/impression fraud’ and when advertisers have no way to reconcile numbers via IP addresses – they have no recourse.

It is certain that we will never see IPs from these major PPC’s/Ad Networks – short of a court order as of this writing.

The PPC’s search engines & Ad Networks realize that if they disclose IP addresses to advertisers they will be inundated with reconciliation claims or frivolous & alleged lawsuits of click fraud and overcharging at the very least.

So in the end we see click/impression counts and how much money has been deducted from our accounts. When that money is depleted we upload some more. Something is really wrong with that picture.

And how do the major Search Engine PPC and Ad Networks respond to this?

1. They say it’s an invasion of their ‘users’ privacy to provide their IP’s to Advertisers. How freaking convenient! How about adding a clause into the privacy policy page of the web site that says:

“We provide a record of the users IP addresses to our advertisers when any user of this web site clicks on any of our sponsor’s ads.”

I am not an attorney but I do know that you can almost do anything if you disclose it upfront first to all parties involved.

2. Secondly they say keep an eye on ROI (return on investment) because that’s what matters the most. DUH as if we don’t know that already.

This is a diversion tactic. Of course major PPC’s/Ad Networks do not want you to keep an eye on:

– IP’s to determine real visitors

– Repeat clicks coming from same IP’s within 24 hours (btw some PPC/Adnetworks charge for repeat clicks in less than 5 minutes intervals when 10 years ago acceptable time duration intervals was to charge for one IP per 24 hours..)

We predict that millions upon millions are being lost and profited by PPC search engines & Ad Networks due to overcharging for repeat IP clicks.

– Incoming IP’s from anonymous proxies used to hide identities and commit fraud.

– Blacklisted IP’s & Domains.

…to mention a few.

I recently spoke with one of my colleagues that I have known for over 10 years and is well-respected throughout the net. When I explain to him my concerns he immediately responded.

“It’s a Racket!”

– Which pretty much sums up this entire article in our opinion?

– It’s time for a change.

– It’s time to become aware of unfair terms and conditions grandfathered-in by the major search engine PPC’s and Ad Networks that are extremely one-sided and intended to create a Cash-Cow opportunity for themselves and their investors.

If you have ever been to Las Vegas you know that the “house always wins”. It’s not a wonder that most major advertisers moved over to CPA business models long ago. But as you might expect the CPA industry is currently being powered by PPC biz models and that brings us back to “The Racket.”

I will save that view for another article.

[ad_2]

Source by Wayne DM