Google AdWords *IS* Charging For Multiple Clicks
Published February 20, 2009Let me explain what’s going on. I have an AdWords campaign running in a very competitive niche and that makes keywords costly. It’s bad enough that I have to fight off competitors clicking on my ads to jack up my advertising costs, but I also have to do battle with Google as to what defines duplicate or multiple clicks from the same IP address.
Some visitors double-click on the ads because that’s just what some visitors do. We’ve been taught we need to double-click on an icon to execute it. Some people do that with hyperlinks, too. AdWords ads are no exception. I have proof in my server logs that Google does not charge for the second click.
However, and here’s where my argument is, Google DOES charge for a second click if it’s not immediately following the first click, but it IS within a few minutes of the first click. This morning I had yet another such incident. I was in the middle of documenting it and by the time I was finished, it was 3.
In summary, here’s what happened and then I’ll get into the details. As I write this, I have been charged for 9 clicks on my ad. I am an affiliate selling “widgets”. When I go to my affiliate back office at the widget company to check my visitor stats, it only reports 6 visits. It shows me their IP addresses. Why only 6 when Google is charging me for 9? Because my widget stats are for unique visits. That means some of my visitors clicked my ad more than once.
Hmmm, let’s have a look. I am running AdWatcher click fraud software on my web server. When I go to the fraud report, lookie, lookie what I see…
3 of the IP address click twice. Notice the First Click and Last Click columns. The numbers I wrote in red are how many minutes difference between the first and last click.
So, let’s do some math. 6 unique visits + 3 visitors clicking 2x = 9 clicks that I got charged for.
This goes on almost every damn day. You can’t imagine how many HOURS I spend pouring over my web server logs, AdWatcher fraud reports, Google AdWords charges, and anything else that I can get my hands on to prove that I’m being charged for multiple clicks from the same IP.
Today was the 3rd time I wrote Google about this and I better not get the same damn canned paragraphs pasted into their reply. Here’s how it always goes down…
Take note how nebulous Google’s answers are.
Google: – Return visits: Individual users may legitimately click on your ad more than one time when comparison shopping or returning to your site for more information.
What I think: What G fails to define is the time between clicks. Hours later in the day or the next day is a “return visit”. Clicking within minutes of the first click is NOT a return visit. Unless it’s a competitor clicking up my bill (which is hard to prove on it’s own merit), OF COURSE THEY ARE COMPARISON SHOPPING. You’re a search engine for crying out loud! They’re looking for shit. I can tell they are shopping because I can see the keywords they are searching for in my server logs.
But here’s the thing of it, I already went through my ad testing, all the SEO on my both my landing page and ads, and have tested a ton of keywords. I have kept the best of the best. I have one landing page, one highly tuned ad, and only a handful of very profitable keywords. When those visitors click more than once on my ad, THEY KEEP CLICKING THE SAME DAMN AD BECAUSE I’M ONLY RUNNING ONE DAMN AD!
I could be flexible on that stance IF I was rotating ads or displaying different ads for different keywords, but I’m not. I’m running one damn ad for the whole shebang. That’s it.
Or, OR, here’s another explanation. Maybe they ARE my competitors and they KNOW that I’m going to be charged again for a click becuase they know that they only have to wait 3 minutes as they’ve gone through the same damn thing themselves!
Google: – Shared IPs: Multiple clicks from a single source may be due to an Internet Service Provider (ISP) assigning identical IP addresses to multiple users. Certain ISPs, such as AOL, distribute a relatively small number of shared, rotating IP addresses to a large number of users. As a result, multiple visitors may access your site from identical IP addresses, giving the impression of repeated clicks from a single visitor.
What I think: BULLSHIT! Bull f@*&$%* shit. Google cannot look me in the eye and tell me that AOL or any other ISP is turning out IP addresses within 3 minutes of the first click to another computer, again going to Google, again running the same operating system, again using the same browser, again searching for widgets, and again clicking on my ONE ad. What I just described is NOT going to happen. The odds are astronomical, especially since my miniscule amount of traffic doesn’t even warrant it. What a crock of shit!
Google: – Web server logs: Your site’s web server logs include data for all visitors to your site, not just those who arrived after clicking on an AdWords ad. You may also see ‘Google.com’ referrers from users who reached your site via the Google search results. Please be assured that your account would only be charged for clicks your ads received.
What I think: I KNOW all of my traffic goes into my server logs. I KNOW how to read my damn logs. I know how to tell a Google.com search visitor vs. a Goggle AdWords visitor. I’m looking at the raw data logs I can get from cPanel. You see, while the server logs do contain all visitors, it does it in a nice and neat chronogical order complete with timestamps. My visitors can’t fart on my site without me knowing about it.
You see, when my ad is clicked, Google tags the hit with a unique ID string in a variable called “gclid”. If a person refreshes the page and reloads it, I see duplicate gclid’s. I KNOW about that. I see them from time to time. The same thing can also happen when a person bookmarks the page when coming from an ad. If they access the bookmark later on, I’ll see the same gclid. But what I’m describing here is NOT a refresh to reload the page. I am seeing another unique gclid on the 2nd clicks in question. These are NOT page refreshes.
Oh, well here’s an interesting turn of events. I started writing this article with 9 clicks on the ad. I have now had 18 clicks and 0 sales. 5 of those clicks are duplicates. I average 1 sale out of every 3-4 clicks. My bill for that ad is now $32.09.
Here is the updated AdWatcher click fraud report. I am being charged for these 5 extra multiple clicks.
How am I supposed to convince Google that they are WRONG in charging me for these extra clicks? I’m not talking about sales conversions here. I’m not talking about the quality of the ad or landing page. The problem I want resolved is what in the hell do I have to do to convice Google that I should NOT be paying for those multiple clicks that are within minutes of each other?
The answers they gave me the first 2 times I contacted them were to passify me. The casual user isn’t experienced enough to know that Google is giving them a snow job. More often than not they prolly don’t even get a 2nd peep out of people when they hear that shit. They’re trying to blow us off with their bogus “well here’s maybe why this could happen”. BULLSHIT
I want answers. I want Google to LOOK at the data. They can see the IP addresses on there end. They’re hoping I’ll go away.
Day after day, month after month this happens. I can’t sit here and monitor these damn server logs all damn day. What the hell am I suppose to do? Conduct month ends and send pages of data to Google showing proof and demanding that I get my money back?
What’s it going to take? A class action lawsuit? There are others out there in this very same boat. I KNOW you know what I’m talking about. If you have had the same problem as myself, post a comment. Let everyone know what it took for you to get your money back. If you’re using click fraud tracking software, tell us what kind and if it’s helped you out.
I say get the shovel. The Big G is going under. Google WILL refund millions of dollars when the shit hits the fan.
UPDATE – February 23, 2009
I received a reply from the AdWords team yesterday. Here’s what they said:
Please allow me to inform you that I’ve decided to escalate your issue
concerning getting duplicate clicks on your Google AdWords ads from
certain IP) addresses to specialist team, which will perform a thorough
investigation into this issue.However, these investigations can take some time, but please be assured
that we will contact you to let you know about the conclusions of our
investigation.I sincerely appreciate your patience while we investigate for you.
I hope that this information is helpful for you. Additionally, you can
please visit our Help Center at https://adwords.google.com/support, where
you’ll find answers to many frequently asked questions. We look forward to
providing you with the most effective advertising available.
Now I wait. Perhaps supplying hard evidence like IP addresses and timestamps is the way to handle this. Maybe that’s why this time I got a rise out of them. One thing I would like to add, when I went to bed that evening the double-clicks had increased from 4 to 6.
SUB ROSA: I’m going to start doing “month ends” on my logs. I shouldn’t have to do that! It’s like turning on a hidden video camera in the livingroom when you leave the house to make sure the babysitter isn’t abusing your kid. It’s like sneaking hair strands from your kid’s hairbrush to have them drug tested. It’s like hiring a detective to follow your wife around to take pictures of her kissing another man at their secret meeting place in the local park. IT’S LIKE CATCHING GOOGLE CHARGING ME FOR CLICKS THAT I SHOULD HAVE TO PAY FOR.
This would all be resolved if Google would allow its advertisers to turn on an option like “unique visitors only” and then specify how many days you’d like to do that before those same visitors are allowed to see your ad again. Like this: ClickThru.com has that feature so your points don’t get gobbled up a handful of point happy collecting scum. I can set my account to block out duplicates for, say, a week. That way visitors won’t see my ad in rotation for a week after they see it the first time and I keep my hard earned points longer without waisting them on the same perps day after day.
Can you imagine how much money that would save advertisers in AdWords expenses? It’s mindnumbing. Can you imagine how much money G would lose, yet rightfully so? Those double-clicks do NOTHING for me but drain my bank account and fill G’s. It’s sooooo evil.
Oh, OH! Something else that Google tightens the screws on to make sure you keep feeding their cash cow - they allow you to block individual IP addresses on a campaign, but they limit it to just 30 IPs! I just want to spit blood on these bastards.
I’ll let you know what G says after their investigation.
25 Responses to Google AdWords *IS* Charging For Multiple Clicks
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Fucking good post!!!
Google is making millions with this.
Not everyone has the time and the pacience to track the ips, and would give up when the second google email arrives.
You made some good points there. I did a search on the topic and found most people will agree with your blog.\par
Yes I’ve had the same complaint. The first time I emailed google support, I had a canned response. At the end of the month they gave me back like $1.50
I set up statcounter for my website a few months ago. Yes, I set it up, but I didn’t pay attention to the logs. I only decided to recently track it because I was spending at least $30 a day in advertising. On some of those days, I had no orders.
So Last week, I decided to track and match what google said was clicked. And what do you know, I’m being overcharged. I have soo many multiple clicks within minutes of each other. At the moment, I’m gathering a very detailed log of all ips, visit path, time stamp. Honestly, I should get hundreds back.
As stated earlier, we shouldn’t have to track this. This is hours of wasted time. I may have to seek other advertising methods if this keeps up.
Dawn
I agree we have the same situation here. I run a small service oriented company. Google adwords is our primary means of advertising and the multiple click situation has turned an effective marketing tool into a constant worry about being overcharged. With our clicks averaging $3 – $6 each, these add up quickly. How can you properly plan a campaign without a somewhat accurate estimate of what potential customers may cost?
I totally agree with you. I have statcounter on my site and often there are multiple clicks (once there were 31) on my ad from the same PC all at a space of a few minutes. There are people out there who know the weaknesses with google adwords and are using them to destroy their competiotion by clicking on ads displayed in the google search page.
Yes, Dev Raj, I suffer from the same competitive clicking. We all do. One of these days there is going to be a come to Jesus meeting for Google and the end result will be a massive class action lawsuit. I don’t know why it hasn’t happened already. I would suggest backing up those server logs to prepare for the day so we all have our proof in hand.
Not much into Adwords but interesting to see the fact that when anyone clicks on Adsense with this intensity, they’re likely to be reported as fake clicks.
But when any customer deliberately clicks on Adwords site, Google doesn’t count them as a fake one ?
This would have charged you so much dude! I am sure some of your competitors would be doing it deliberately or some newbies clicking who actually have no idea what it costs to the advertiser.
Why don’t you try to naturally come up to the rankings as well by doing some SEO etc?
Showing up at a reasonable position in the SERPS is not always possible. I’m into some very competitive shit and if I want to be seen now, not months from now, it has to be PPC. Google doesn’t know what “fake” is. Visually, I can see it in my logs, but it takes WEEKS and MONTHS of convincing Google of it. The crap about AOL reassigning IP addresses is total bullshit. When I have Adwords clicks within minutes of each other with the same IP address, there is NOOO way they are different people coming from AOL who just happen to be searching on my shit. Not in that short time frame. I’m in a very competitive market, but I do have a narrow focus on one particular vendor. Google’s techs are trained to snowball people so they go away.
I just had the same conversation with someone at google in chat. I got the same excuses as you’ve listed for the third time. It’s the same that comes from the adwords help section.
I also seem to be getting multiple clicks from the same ips. Adwords is really crappy and I expect more from a company like Google. It is annoying that you cant even put an account wide exclusion on IP’s. Is there any other tool around that is just used to track click fraud? Adwatcher seems to do a whole lot of other stuff which I don;t need.
Adwords is a very cheap and targetted form of advertising, so advertisers will put up with more.
@TigerTom, I need to disagree on that to some extent. Just last night I was doing some keyword research where terms were nearing $40/keyword. That’s not cheap. A word of warning, though, if you find cheap keywords, that means there’s little to no searching on them which defeats the purpose of using them. Plus, they bring down the performance score on your campaigns.
About the “put up with” it part, unfortunately I call it giving up. Google reps are trained Ninjas in the art of snowballing and side-stepping questions. Rather than actually help you, all they do is stall you as long as they can by copying and pasting endless URLs for your review in hopes that you’ll give up your quest for answers.
Whenever I have a problem with Microsoft adCenter and submit a support ticket, I don’t get a canned email reply, I get a phone call! Just last week I spent 3-1/2 hours on the phone with a rep helping me set up new adCenter campaigns and going over my existing ones. All of a sudden shit that wasn’t even getting displays suddenly started working. Google doesn’t do that. They only want the money, but won’t work for it. It’s going to take a while for adCenter to catch up to Google, but with customer support like that and constant improvement to the campaign manager, it shouldn’t be too long.
That article you wrote rocks.
When I am asking around, nobody I talk to has ever seemed to take notice of that except you.
From the data on your site, it appears to be they count any click that took longer than 3 seconds.
Is that what you found as well?
Please fire me an e-mail if you don’t mind.
@Purposenic, no one is going to notice it unless they get under the covers and check their server logs. Everything is tracked by IP address and timestamp in there.
My mistake on my above post.
Did you find it to be 3 minutes or less that they did not charge for it?
Did you ever play and try to figure out the exact time period they are using?
Thanks!
dk
@Purposeinc, don’t know about the 3 minute thing, but as near as I can tell, they don’t charge for double-clicks. Some people double-click on everything to go to it. I had some click tracking software installed at one time on my site and I could see the double-clicks. Google didn’t charge for those. Now don’t quote me on this, but I think I did get charged for clicks under 3 minutes that weren’t obvious double-clicks. They’ve not very forgiving about it because that’s money for them. And no, I didn’t play. At $3/keyword it didn’t seem like a game I wanted to play. LOL However, I guess paying a few bucks up front to test it may have been worth it in the long run. PROVIDED you can get any one over there to take action on it. They bury you with bullshit answers hoping you’ll go away. I’m so sick of Google cutting and pasting crap from their guidelines and calling it an answer. I’ve stopped using Adwords. After having paid over $16,000 in advertising to them over the years, they screwed me over. That’s another long story. So I went to Microsoft adCenter. Instead of getting cut and paste answers to my support tickets, dude, they CALL ME!!!! I just about died. They want Google’s business bad and they are fighting for it with great customer service. I wasn’t familiar with the new adCenter interface. They did a lot of work to it. I spent 3-1/2 hours on the phone with a rep. She explained every little detail. She told me she would keep an eye on my ads to see how they do. Then she kept her word and called back 2 weeks later. Awesome service. Google would never do that.
I love this article. I have exactly the same problem. And I’ll tell you the cause: Tabbed browsing.
People open up google in a window, search for somethin, click on ur ad and it opens in a new tab. They have a read, go make a coffee, take a dump, then come back. They do some more browsing, but have opened a new firefox/ie window and are back at google. They then think ahh what was that kick ass site i was looking at that i now dont realise is still open in my other fricken browser window… oh yeh thats it ill google it again. and click theyve clicked ur ad again.
this always happens to me at least 5 time a day, bye bye $5. bye bye $35 a week. bye bye… well you do the math.
then again, i do this all the time. i have my hotmail account open in about 3 different tabs accross different browser windows as we speak lol.
I’m seeing this same damn issue. I just opened a ticked tonight. I have multiple clicks within 30 seconds of each other from multiple IP’s. Interesting that they call come from the same geographic area of my 5 competitors.
We’ll see what they come back with. But if it’s unacceptable, I’ll find someone else to advertise with. I’m spending $1500+ a month with google.
I have found the same thing happening on my site. I should have tracked those information and I was too trusted in Google.com before. What should I do? Should I send an email to them to ask for money? Do they refund according to my calculation or to theirs?
Hey, thanks for sharing this. I actually got banned from Google Adwords for promoting a product called Tinnitus Miracle…apparently they dont like it when you promote products which claim to be able to perform miracles – even though the product I was promoting didnt claim to do miracles – it was just the name of the product!
You may be interested, this is directly from google help docs.
“For example, if a user clicks on your ad once, clicks the ‘back’ button, and then clicks your ad again, AdWords will register two clicks while Analytics will register one visit.”
via: http://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=55610
First bullet, last line.
I have exactly the same problem.
Just yesterday. Total of 10 clicks (but very expensive ones)
3 came from the same city, the same IP within 45 minutes.
2 others also.
Out of 10 clicks, that is 3 double clicks, i.e. 30% of my 500€/month bill.
I have documented this for the last two years. I have even sent them a snail letter.
I only get a standard reply by email.
I have closed my campaigns today.
I hate being screwed.
I am not surprised by this, even google can make a huge mistakes that cost big bucks.
But actually what you ar having might be any of the following 2 reasons or may be something else:
1-May be google’s click fraud protection has big flaw
2-May be the cookies on the clickers computer have a long life time
But certainly it is a technical issue….It just makes me wonder how many millions did google STEAL!!!! and people don’t know it.
Too bad
I agree about the support issue.
The difference between Google support and Microsoft support is like night and day!