I just received the following from Chitika after asking them why my audited revenue was reduced to ZERO. “I was just informed that your account has been under review for fraud, which is why your revenue was removed. Your account "myaccount" has just been confirmed to be in breech of our terms and conditions and has now been deactivated after seeing significant amounts of fraudulent traffic. An email notification will be sent to you shortly. Best Regards, Karla Chitika Customer Service†To begin with, I’m a lot of things, but I’m not dishonest. In fact, I worked fairly hard to try and find some referrals to bring into Chitika because I was convinced that it was a good program. My mistake was seeing some warning signs raised by other webmasters and not working hard to dig into things a little deeper. I want to warn everyone to think twice before depending too much on these guys. The nice thing is they turned by revenue to ZERO, yet didn’t tell me until I asked what was going on. I wonder how many months they would have let me run their ads for NO return? Oh well, live and learn I guess. --Mark
I agree. I used them once and I got paid the small $23 payout, but I just didn't see a whole lot of value in it. My visitors, specifically, weren't interested and it was more of a problem than a pleasure for them. The company is still too new and doesn't have a strong track record like ValueClick or Google, yet. I would give it at least a years before considering using them full time again. Good warning to others though.
I agree, they said they sent the payment via Paypal and it's not there. I emailed them that I did not receive, but they said they sent it and verified the paypal ID which is correct. And they say they can not do anything else. I said give me the transaction ID and they don;t respond.
I don't trust these guys at all. We need to get some disgruntled webmasters together and googlebomb this thread (or another Chitika warning page) to the top of the serps. Who's with me? I've got some link-vault vaultage I'll donate... ;-)
Actually, I believe they've created a fine job of promoting their own demise. It's a shame, coulda been a nice tool.
They aint as good as adsense Ive moved them to the bototm of the page they generate less per click.. however google seems to be running stupidly slow today
Whatcha sayin' JJ? Anyone who has used link-vault or the coop is dishonest? The fact remains that my sites get a lot of traffic and I sent a lot of clicks their way... my complaints still stand: 1. They never paid me. 2. They suspended my account and never notifed me. 3. Lots of other webmasters have found themselves in the same situation http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=48428