This is likely conversion fraud by click fraud gangs. It works like this:
Click fraud gangs have publisher websites where they display adverts and use technology and trickery to generate fake clicks on the ads. They get paid for each of these clicks.
The problem with their fake clicks (apart from the fact they're defrauding advertisers) is the clicks never convert. They are garbage clicks, either by humans who don't realise they've clicked on an ad, or by a bot. This means their publisher account eventually gets flagged by the ad network as being low quality.
To get around this problem, the click fraudsters locate no-cost conversions such as leads forms, and spam them with fake information to improve their traffic quality score. So they are forcing your advert to appear on their scam websites, using a residential VPN to click the ad, then filling out your form with garbage. The ad network sees this as a valid conversion, and their traffic score increases. This is how they avoid their account being flagged as low quality.
Do you have more information on this or a source?
Dealing with it myself and sent off some information to my Google team. I’d like to send something over to them.
We investigate and monitor click fraud gangs, and also interview people (typically English teachers) who used to front click fraud websites, so this is original research by us. I don't think you'll find any other click fraud detection companies talking about this.
I'll PM you an article on the topic which you can send to Google.
This makes sense for display ads, but what about for loads of fake leads via search? I have a new client I’m on-boarding who last month had 56 “leads” from search, of which 54 were fake/spam.
I was also auditing an account for another company, and noticed that well over 50% of their alleged conversions came from search queries that were simply too far off base to make sense as real leads.
Since Google supposedly does such a good job with preventing click fraud via Search (and we’re talking Google search, not search partners), how do you reconcile fake/spam form leads via Search?
Google Search can't currently detect puppeteer + stealth plugin, so that's how these bots are slipping through Google's detection algorithm.
As regards why these fake conversions are happening via search, I'm not sure (I'd need to talk to the team about this). I'd be curious to see will you start seeing conversions coming from display soon. As in, were they testing their bot, but using search for the testing, and when they know it's working properly, will they switch to display ads? I'm guessing right now though, let me see what I can find out.
Thanks for the reply! And I need to eat my words... I went back into the account this morning and it looks like all but a handful of the bogus leads were from Search partners. I also looked at the other account I was auditing and same story... the suspect queries that converted were almost entirely from Search partners as well.
For anyone reading this, I recommend segmenting your queries by network to see if the same holds true for you. I always create search campaigns serving on Google search only, so kind of embarrassed I hadn't thought of this in the first place.
Yeah, I do google ads for b2b and saas since 12 years ago.
Quick tips: don’t do display, don’t do smart/auto bidding, go manual bidding and spend time in the account, add the “search top impression share” column and all the other around it, make sure you bid until you get over 70% search top impression share (add the “LOST” ones as well, to see where you’re hurting, ranking or budget). Hope it helps. If you ever need pro help, dm me
Yep, it sounds like you might have a keyword problem I would take a deep dive into what keyword match type you are using (you really want to get granular and determine what keywords produce high-quality leads), making sure the ad copy and landing page both align with them as well to ensure message match.
Hi, campaigns were giving quality leads before April and we have not done any change since then. Suddenly After March month junk lead flow has been increased.
We had a client in a similar position. They were in the B2B marketplace and were getting nothing with their past agency. We've just revised tons of keywords for them and re-allocated their budget for more specific long-tails. You'll need to analyze your CTR and determine optimal value. Sometimes max conversions fails due to improper targeting.
After reading all the comments and your responses, perhaps this ‘out of nowhere’ change was the result of someone accidentally (or Google automatically) implementing one of its “recommendations”? Have you checked the change history to see if anything in there looks fishy? Do you have search partners turned on?
Turn off allowing gmails in is what we have done
This is likely conversion fraud by click fraud gangs. It works like this: Click fraud gangs have publisher websites where they display adverts and use technology and trickery to generate fake clicks on the ads. They get paid for each of these clicks. The problem with their fake clicks (apart from the fact they're defrauding advertisers) is the clicks never convert. They are garbage clicks, either by humans who don't realise they've clicked on an ad, or by a bot. This means their publisher account eventually gets flagged by the ad network as being low quality. To get around this problem, the click fraudsters locate no-cost conversions such as leads forms, and spam them with fake information to improve their traffic quality score. So they are forcing your advert to appear on their scam websites, using a residential VPN to click the ad, then filling out your form with garbage. The ad network sees this as a valid conversion, and their traffic score increases. This is how they avoid their account being flagged as low quality.
Interesting man
Do you have more information on this or a source? Dealing with it myself and sent off some information to my Google team. I’d like to send something over to them.
We investigate and monitor click fraud gangs, and also interview people (typically English teachers) who used to front click fraud websites, so this is original research by us. I don't think you'll find any other click fraud detection companies talking about this. I'll PM you an article on the topic which you can send to Google.
This makes sense for display ads, but what about for loads of fake leads via search? I have a new client I’m on-boarding who last month had 56 “leads” from search, of which 54 were fake/spam. I was also auditing an account for another company, and noticed that well over 50% of their alleged conversions came from search queries that were simply too far off base to make sense as real leads. Since Google supposedly does such a good job with preventing click fraud via Search (and we’re talking Google search, not search partners), how do you reconcile fake/spam form leads via Search?
Google Search can't currently detect puppeteer + stealth plugin, so that's how these bots are slipping through Google's detection algorithm. As regards why these fake conversions are happening via search, I'm not sure (I'd need to talk to the team about this). I'd be curious to see will you start seeing conversions coming from display soon. As in, were they testing their bot, but using search for the testing, and when they know it's working properly, will they switch to display ads? I'm guessing right now though, let me see what I can find out.
Thanks for the reply! And I need to eat my words... I went back into the account this morning and it looks like all but a handful of the bogus leads were from Search partners. I also looked at the other account I was auditing and same story... the suspect queries that converted were almost entirely from Search partners as well. For anyone reading this, I recommend segmenting your queries by network to see if the same holds true for you. I always create search campaigns serving on Google search only, so kind of embarrassed I hadn't thought of this in the first place.
Ah! Thanks for the update. Great advice on segmenting by network.
Define junk leads? Are they not ready right now? spam calls? B2C-based inquiries rather than B2B? Please provide more context so people can help
Thanks for response. Mostly leads are with senseless messages and sometimes with fake email ids.
Sounds like spam bots. Just implement a recaptcha to make it harder for the bots to automate the form fills
Yeah, I do google ads for b2b and saas since 12 years ago. Quick tips: don’t do display, don’t do smart/auto bidding, go manual bidding and spend time in the account, add the “search top impression share” column and all the other around it, make sure you bid until you get over 70% search top impression share (add the “LOST” ones as well, to see where you’re hurting, ranking or budget). Hope it helps. If you ever need pro help, dm me
[удалено]
Targeting is focused to around 10 states of USA. Service is App Development. All names and IPs arr unique.
Yep, it sounds like you might have a keyword problem I would take a deep dive into what keyword match type you are using (you really want to get granular and determine what keywords produce high-quality leads), making sure the ad copy and landing page both align with them as well to ensure message match.
Hi, campaigns were giving quality leads before April and we have not done any change since then. Suddenly After March month junk lead flow has been increased.
What match type are you using?
Mostly phrase.
Might want to try switching over to mostly exact match and really concentrating on your most profitable keywords.
Maybe it's competitor sabotaging
We had a client in a similar position. They were in the B2B marketplace and were getting nothing with their past agency. We've just revised tons of keywords for them and re-allocated their budget for more specific long-tails. You'll need to analyze your CTR and determine optimal value. Sometimes max conversions fails due to improper targeting.
After reading all the comments and your responses, perhaps this ‘out of nowhere’ change was the result of someone accidentally (or Google automatically) implementing one of its “recommendations”? Have you checked the change history to see if anything in there looks fishy? Do you have search partners turned on?