[Harry Pickle]

I have to tell you as a person that spent over $17,000 on AdWords so far this year that I get a TON of multiple hits from places that don't even closely resemble people interested in the products I offer for sale. For the month of May for example, 1 IP address had over 1,600+ clicks on my adwords ad. When I contacted AdWords support they said they "We have tools to address that" and that was that. I for one don't believe them for a second. If they did have tools to wipe out multiple clicks prove it by showing me the IP addresses for each click.

1. Google is a billion dollar industry. For them to monitor their own actions is like having the fox guard the henhouse. Insane....

2. I asked Google to provide me with a list of IP addresses for each clicked on ad. "We don't have the ability to do that" Yeah, right...

3. Right now about 40% of my profit is ate up by Google. I would love to change that. BUT - Yahoo, MSN and the other weak sisters don't give me the traffic. Plain and simple truth. I can spend $100 on Google and count on making $160. I can spend $100 on Yahoo and MAYBE make $105.

I need a plan.

You might be interested in this lengthy report on G's invalid click practices. It may not really make you feel a lot better, but it's at least info that I don't think was available at all previously.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/pdf/Tuzhilin_Report.pdf

On the poll question, there's no entity that has jurisdiction worldwide. And the report above references the "fundamental problem" of PPC advertising:

Based on the discussions in Sections 8.1 and 8.2, we conclude that there is a fundamental
problem associated with the definition of invalid clicks for the Pay-per-Click model. This
problem can be summarized as follows:
• There is no conceptual definition of invalid clicks that can be operationalized in
the sense defined above.
• An operational definition cannot be fully disclosed to the general public because
of the concerns that unethical users will take advantage of it, which may lead to a
massive click fraud. However, if it is not disclosed, advertisers cannot verify or
even dispute why they have been charged for certain clicks.

[Harry Pickle]

Yes, that is the fly in the ointment. No jurisdiction of the internet. So, Google and other companies can continue to charge for invalid (fraudulent) clicks and get away with it.

In reviewing the document you supplied, thanks by the way, the conclusion was that Google's efforts were reasonable to prevent click fraud. I find that to be a joke. I KNOW for a fact that an outfit called SHOPZILLA.COM and BUSINESS.COM both have software, or real people to drive up revenue for PPC accounts. I have banned them both from my AdWords with a prefilter. BUT, here is exactly why I know Google is still hosing me. I continue to get clicks from both websites even after I engaged the prefilter.

I contacted Google and said, "Hey, I used your prefilter and the clicks are still coming!"

Their reply was "We cannot stop that because we don't have the ability to monitor 3rd party clicks."

What a crock of BS..... Why even offer a prefilter (they call it an "excluded site list) if it doesn't work?

I know why, because they want to make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside while they continue to rape you.

does Adwords help in promoting your site? Or does it purely just provide adertisements? Sorry, I've been asked to sign up to adwords with my fire brigades site as they think it will help promote it in the search engine list. I just want to know if I'm wasting money...

[thebookish]

If adwords is the only way you can get to your customers then you have t use it, maybe try so more little companies other than the biggest three.

[VanBasten]

Well, I for one am surprised to find that google actually allowed click fraud to take place. I always find that they have very stringent policies with regard to this in place and that they actually do enforce them rigidly. For instance, I know of a forum whereby people would click on the google ads repeatedly, even when nobody told them to do so, just to ensure that there will be enough money to sustain the forum. However, google soon found out and suspended the owner's account.

I believe they definitely have the tools to show the IP addresses of each and every click. But the question is, are they allowed to do so? Privacy comes into question over here.

I am glad to see that you are having success with adwords so far. My suggestion is - "If it ain't broken, why bother to fix it?"

[Wekky]

It's funny how once I saw a user complain on google (he was a publisher) saying his account was closed as they've detected fraudelent clicks on his ads.

And the retorical question he asked was:
Would google refund the money to the advertisers for the fraudelent clicks?

It's funny how some publishers thought their accounts we're canceled by google just not to get payed, and they thought they we're the only one losing. Apparently google kicks both advertisers and publishers asses.

As he's said in that post, "Google will lose business if it continues to target small publishers for profit".

I find this totally true, how come GOOGLE, the fastest and high tech developing, can't monitor ips and block them automatically? Or it can't read what server the ads are host on, and prevent evil users from posting the ads with your ad code everywhere, so you get banned?

That's all a little fishy to me. And now I don't know what ad network to choose. (As i'm a publisher myself)

[Life Xpect]

The smaller they are, the more they care about their users.

[ebittner]

Yea I think google is evil but I still lovethem and I already know that by 2020 they will own 1/6 of the entire world. They are growing like wildfire and spreading out so if one part of them dies the other parts will just grow stornger.

[mann3r]

but is there any way that say , i dont want my ads to appear in this sets of ip, is that possible in adwords?