Proactively reporting possible AdSense click fraud to avoid getting kicked out of AdSense
Although I discussed click fraud quite extensively in my AdSense book, I don't think I spent enough time discussing click fraud warning signs and what to do about it. One of my readers just had his AdSense account suspended by Google due to click fraud and is trying to get re-instated. Now, I don't know the specifics of this person's earnings, but here are some things to be suspicious about:
- High clickthrough ratio (CTR) — if I see my CTR for any channel go over 10%, I look closely at what's happening with the pages in that channel. You should have a similar threshhold for your account based on what's a “normal” CTR for your site.
- Regularly-spaced clicks — if you're getting an impression every N seconds, with hardly any variation, with corresponding clicks, think fraud. To know this you need access to your server logs, though a high CTR ratio will probably tip you off as well.
- Off-peak activity — if a lot of clicks are occurring when you're sleeping, is that normal activity for your site?
The key thing with click fraud is to be proactive about reporting it to Google. If I suspect something, I tell Google about it and I do my best to stop the fraud from continuing, even if I have to shut down ads on certain pages for a while. While the AdSense terms and conditions don't require you to report possible click fraud, in my mind it's an implicit duty. If it doesn't look like you're helping to avoid the problem, Google may consider you to be part of the problem and shut you out of their program. No AdSense publisher wants to be suspended or terminated. Isn't it better to get the “all clear” from Google instead?