A more or less theoretical question on clicking one's own ads

[tayiper]

Not that I have any intent to do so (I agree and understand that it wouldn't be fair etc.), but I am just curious about it in theory ...


Consider this particular example. I connect to the Internet with/though a dial-up connection, therefore I have a new IP each time I (re)connect. So the only way for Google folks to know it was me clicking my own ads is if I would be logged-into the Google AdSense site, and at the very same time, I would click on my own ad. But even then, what if this particular computer is used by more than one person (be it my family members or other people on for instance, computer at work)


Futher, I have three separate dial-up accounts (i.e. three different ISPs), so what if I would always use one of them to login to Google AdSense, and use othe other two for clicking my own ads ??


P.S. -- And yeah, what about PCs in public libraries and cyber-caffes ?? I think that there is no way for Google to know was it me or someone else that clicked on an ad. So could please anyone explain all this to me !!


thanks for any reply, tayiper

[Roman]

If you start getting clicks over and over again from the same ISP or ISPs that happen to be close to your own ISP, it will raise flags. You could only fool them for so long, but the clicking pattern would not look natural and they would eventually ban you.

[Art]

In all honesty, if you're making the brunt of your income from clicking on your own ads through public computers etc. Then you really need to optimize your site to generate income from actual visitors. Plus they'll notice a stupidly high CTR.

[Old Welsh Guy]

Clicking on your own ads, ie clicking from a machine or IP you have accessed your account from is dangerous in the extreme. Google also use smart technology to 'best guess' the likelihood of cheating.

I have clicked on my own ads, in fact I clicked on an add and spent a few Hundred £ on my own forum. If you run a forum, and it is based on a subject you love, it is inconcievable that you will NOT click on an ad! However, I guess I had had around 20k impressions to one click.

Google can record so much information about the user that cheating will become obvious over a period of time.

Let me explain. I have one site that is earning me about £8 average per click. The traffic to this site is low, but the CTR is 14% . Much of my traffic is viral, ie people are emailing the link to friends and family, because the content I am giving away for FREE is being sold around the web for £50. Initially I was EXTREMELY worried about the high CTR (especially as I am earning decent money from one page). But the reality is that many of these users will have the toolbar installed, or will have google cookies on their machine, and google will see that my page is relevant to the pages/searches that these machines have carried out.

I guess what I am trying to say, is that Google are FAR smarter than loking at what your IP is :)

[Tyler Banfield]

I know your question was hypothetical, but for anyone reading this thread, don't risk losing your AdSense account over a few extra dollars from clicking your own ads. Once you lose your account, it's gone forever. Instead of spending time thinking of ways to trick Google, spend that time working on creating content, optimizing you ads, or SEO.

[tayiper]

OK, thanks much both of you for quick replies /EDIT: Well, I see now that I should rather wrote "thanks much all" ...


Anyway, as I wrote in the thread's title (i.e. "A more or less theoretical question...") and in the post itself, I am not planning to do this; nor I was thinking about it. I am simply asking this out of curiousity (I am curious person, lol)


tayiper

[empservices]

a quick thought.

you have multiple cookies from google on your website, your info is stored there. If you have the google toolbar, even more of your information is avaliable to them.

Also if your clicks are few and far between, but you click them in groups (ie: no clicks other then at 5:55pm each day there are 10 clicks on google ads).

I have no proof or even educated guesses on their tracking methods, but we can all speculate.

[KingSEO]

Most people earn more working at McD than clicking your own ads in a fashion like that (with dialup etc).

[bpearson]

cookies will get set with every click

[abcdefGARY]

Never click on your own ads!
Let other people click on your ads. When people click on my ads and the earnings show up the next morning, it always lights up my day to know that people are into my website.

[superclick]

I think with all that money Google made with Adsense they should create system to detect and anull all ilegal clicks and not just ban account.

[Cheap SEO Services]

Just forget it mate! You will get caught no matter how you do it. Google are not stupid! They employ a lot of very smart people that monitor these things. And that's not theoretical! That's fact!

[Indian]

There are lot of other things than just your IP address. As far as ppl at your home are considered I would recommend you to use plugins so that the ads are not displayed on your PC. To stay safe from clicks from same IP address I would suggest you to call up your ISP ask them the IP range provided in your area and deny access to those IPs completely. I had received a warning on a site which was targetted to local ppl in my area, I could not afford to ban IPs in my area and ultimately had to remove AdSense from that site. You might lose a few $ but you wont lose your unlimited $$$$ AdSense account.

IMO AdSense should follow something which YPN is doing. YPN follows a practise of not paying publishers for clicks coming from same PC or IP rather than banning them altogether. Also, something that avoids a set of IPs to view AdSense would be great.

[tayiper]

Well, then what about the so-called "Impressions" then; or are they called "Page Impressions" (I am not quite sure) ??


I mean, as far as I understand, an impression is the number of how many times the add was displayed. Is this also limited, i.e. meaning that I am not allowed to load my own site too many times ?? Is this potentially dangerous in terms of loosing the AdSense account ??


You see, it's that when I am in the process of updating my site, I refresh it many many times, upload some document, realize that I've messed-up something, then upload it again load the site once more etc. etc. One such an example: for instance yesterday one of the AdSense ads was not displayed properly (or rather at all), and so I was refreshing the page in question, checking the document's source etc., all this in an attempt to troubleshoot/discover the culprit. What I want to say is that in this particular case, there is no other way of doing it (i.e. no way around), but being on-line and opening/closing/refreshing the problematic page.


tayiper

[Indian]

You wont get banned by alot of impressions from same ip/PC. Its the clicks tht matters. BTW, placing Ads on free hosting sites is breaking of TOS :)

[tayiper]

You wont get banned by alot of impressions from same ip/PC. Its the clicks tht matters. BTW, placing Ads on free hosting sites is breaking of TOS :)

Well, I am not so sure about this. Others here said it's OK, and Google also confirmed my site, i.e. the one hosted on a free-host ...


tayiper

[Indian]

Cool! I think it is allowed...Then too would recommend mailing Google, asking them and if its a yes then save the email for future problems caused if any.

You have a good site. You should go for some cheap hosting rather then keeping it free. Dont risk your AdSense account with free hosts. Once banned ...you will never be able to join AdSense.

[jackburton2006]

A more or less theoretical question on clicking one's own ads

Put it out of your mind, my son. No matter how smart you think you are, Google has 1,000 geeks on the payroll smarter than you.

[tayiper]

OK, I see that this thread is causing some confusion ...


Well, so once more: IT IS ONLY A THEORETICAL QUESTION, and NO, I DO NOT HAVE ANY INTENT TO DO THIS (i.e. click on my own ads); I mean wtf, don't you believe me, duhh ??


/NOTE: The text above is in upper-case and bolded for emphasis ...


tayiper

[jackburton2006]

Well, so once more: IT IS ONLY A THEORETICAL QUESTION, and NO, I DO NOT HAVE ANY INTENT TO DO THIS (i.e. click on my own ads); I mean wtf, don't you believe me, duhh ??

Oh, let's not kid ourselves. We were all Adsense noobs at one point, and we all entertained this thought, or something like it, when at the beginning. When you're starting out, and not making any money, you think there's nothing to lose, so you start coming up with ideas on how to get some money. Trust me, we've all thought about it. You just happen to have put thought to computer screen, as it were.

P.S. Don't be surprised if Adsense has flagged you as a potential cheater. They have trolls on this board. Believe me. ;)

[MrSupplier]

You better spend time on writing some content and submitting it everywhere
and it will return you some value, more or less monetary

[NewToAllThis]

Google's trolls is why I don't post my site here. ;)

[TommyD]

I was wondering.

Not that I'm flaming anyone, but why do the good people of DP really try to help, and discourage people people who are clearly dishonest from doing dishonest things? They are dishonest for a reason, let them get banned. :D

Some people are too good for their own good. ;)

IMHO: I've almost never heard anyone complain about getting banned for a REAL reason. So if you do something bad, odds are you aren't going to get banned. Just read past "I was banned" threads.

later,

tom

[jackburton2006]

Not that I'm flaming anyone, but why do the good people of DP really try to help, and discourage people people who are clearly dishonest from doing dishonest things? They are dishonest for a reason, let them get banned. :D

Some people are too good for their own good. ;)

The temptation to click on one's own ads, especially for noobs, is incredible. Heck, even when you tell them not to do it, most of them will still do it anyway. :D

[NewToAllThis]

I've never clicked on my own ads. But today I had to right click on an ad to get the URL so I could ad it to my adfilter list. I was sooo nervous! :D

[jackburton2006]

I've never clicked on my own ads. But today I had to right click on an ad to get the URL so I could ad it to my adfilter list. I was sooo nervous! :D

Are you using Firefox? In I.E. you can just place your mouse pointer over the ad and the URL will show up in your lower left window.

[NewToAllThis]

Yes, I am using FF. Thanks for the tip. :D

[KingSEO]

I was wondering.

Not that I'm flaming anyone, but why do the good people of DP really try to help, and discourage people people who are clearly dishonest from doing dishonest things? They are dishonest for a reason, let them get banned. :D

Some people are too good for their own good. ;)

IMHO: I've almost never heard anyone complain about getting banned for a REAL reason. So if you do something bad, odds are you aren't going to get banned. Just read past "I was banned" threads.

later,

tom
What would they be complaining about? "I clicked my own ads and got banned, google is evil". That kind of reasoning doesnt hold.

[Sara]

25 years ago, out of sheer curiosity and nothing else (being a curious kinda a gal), I bought and took home and read avidly the book "How to Commit the Perfect Murder ... In Theory".

Soon I found myself in the local cop shop, desk lamp glaring in my eyes, with bad cop tossing the thumbscrews from hand to hand and good cop pleading with me to fess all as he really couldn't hold bad cop back for much longer.

I really, really wish I'd never let curiosity get the better of me. ;) I don't even _want_ to know how to click my own ads and get away with it! LOL

[TommyD]

What would they be complaining about? "I clicked my own ads and got banned, google is evil". That kind of reasoning doesnt hold.


that is found out after 25 people asking what did they possible do, but the thread usually starts out:
-----------------------------------
thread start from OP: I got banned, I don't know why, I didn't do anything wrong, how can I get back in.

middle: 25 people ask if OP did anything wrong, a few try and help. OP always replies, "I did nothing wrong, G is evil."

Near End: OP admits he/she was just experimenting with a click for click exchange with other webmasters, posted several click requests in forums, and when things were slow, the OP would click many of his ads.

End: Fryman says "I told you so", after posting a 'Not this shit again image'.

OP: says he'll go to YPN next.

three months later, another boob restarts the thread and says something stupid like: "I heard G was evil, my friend did nothing and he too was banned"
--------------------------

Does any of this sound familiar to anyone else here? :rolleyes:


:p

[Agent47]

I've blocked google ads in my browser to avoid invalid impressions and clicks. Here is what you need to do:

Uninstall Internet explorer to get rid of this buggy browser; install Firefox and then get the adblock extension from here: https://addons.mozilla.org/extensions/moreinfo.php?id=10

[profs77]

In addition to cookies IP/Hostname there are Geo-location of your IP address, Window Width, Window Height, Screen Resolution height and width, I won't go on as it would produce cheaters, but its much easier to earn bucket loads of money the right way then the wrong way.

[KingSEO]

Google will eat itself (http://www.gwei.org/index.php) has nice flowcharts for fraudsters wannabes that are lame/stupid/ignorant enough to not even be able to make those themselves.

Not that I encourage or endorse these practices, but the fact is, google isnt unbeatable. And the information is there if you want it.

[tayiper]

I've blocked google ads in my browser to avoid invalid impressions and clicks.
...
install Firefox and then get the adblock extension from here: https://addons.mozilla.org/extensions/moreinfo.php?id=10

Uhhh, thank you sooo much for this tip; you know, I was just attempting to open a thread with question if something like this is possible with Firefox. No wI know, lol ...


P.S. -- However, note that I do know that particular extension for quite some time, it's just that I didn't know that it's possible to block stuff in such manner, i.e. "whole" domain-names, not just separate URLs/graphics ...


tayiper

[NewToAllThis]

Google will eat itself (http://www.gwei.org/index.php) has nice flowcharts for fraudsters wannabes that are lame/stupid/ignorant enough to not even be able to make those themselves.

I almost had a seizure looking at that background. :p

[KingSEO]

It's probably a project done by the same people that made the fake Bhopal-scandal press release, the vote auction-campaign in 2002. The Yes Men. My heroes.

[tayiper]

Well, since this thread is about such a controversal subject (obviously), let me end it by saying: thanks once more to all for your educative replies ...


P.S. -- But to address those folks that simply don't want to believe me: do you think that I am so stupid to cause my AdSense account termination (by clicking my own ads), or what ?? And even posting a thread about it on a public SEO and web-site promotion related forum ??


tayiper

[NewToAllThis]

I believe you tayiper. :)

[jackburton2006]

Well, since this thread is about such a controversal subject (obviously), let me end it by saying: thanks once more to all for your educative replies ...


P.S. -- But to address those folks that simply don't want to believe me: do you think that I am so stupid to cause my AdSense account termination (by clicking my own ads), or what ?? And even posting a thread about it on a public SEO and web-site promotion related forum ??


tayiper

Methinks the fellow doth protests too much. As I said, we've all thought about it at one point or another when we begin using Adsense (myself included). It's human nature to get something for nothing. If you say you've never thought about clicking on your own ads in the beginning, I call "Liar" on you.

[tayiper]

If you say you've never thought about clicking on your own ads in the beginning, I call "Liar" on you.

I haven't said that; with all my posts where I mentioned that I am not planning to do so (click on my own ads), I simply meant that this thread's purpose wasn't to gather information in "that direction", and yes, that I am in fact not planning to do that ...


tayiper

[jackburton2006]

I haven't said that; with all my posts where I mentioned that I am not planning to do so (click on my own ads), I simply meant that this thread's purpose wasn't to gather information in "that direction", and yes, that I am in fact not planning to do that ...


tayiper

Relax. We believe you. ;)