How much of your advertising budget would you like to dedicate to click fraud? We’re guessing, none of it. In an ideal world, none of your ads should get a single fraudulent click. But we don’t live in an ideal world. In fact, Statista estimated that the global cost of digital ad fraud would rise from $84 billion in 2023 to a staggering $172 billion by 2028.

 

Click fraud is only going to become a bigger problem if you don’t address it

As Google is the largest search engine and an effective way to serve ads to any audience, click fraud on Google Ads is a particularly pressing problem. In this article, we will define click fraud, explain its impact on Google Ads, how Google addresses the problem, and what you can do to identify and prevent click fraud on your ads.

What is Click Fraud?

Click fraud is a form of ad fraud that involves unauthorized or misleading clicks on online advertisements. It manifests in various forms:

• Automated Clicks: Bots or click farms generate fake clicks at scale, targeting ads without genuine interest of buying the product or service.
• Competitor Manipulation: Competitors can engage in click fraud to deplete your ad budget or skew your performance metrics.
• Accidental Clicks: Users may click on ads unintentionally, leading to inflated click counts. This can usually be solved easily by changing the ad itself.

The Impact of Click Fraud in Google Ads

The most immediate impact of click fraud is the money you lose because of it. Imagine you have a $10,000 budget for Google Ads, and 14% of the clicks on your ads are fraudulent. Because of techniques like click spamming, fraudsters can drain your ad budget faster than you can imagine.

If you don’t intervene, you’ll have wasted $1,400 of your total budget. Money that could have bought genuine clicks, perhaps even a few customers, was instead spent on automated clicks that never led to anything.

But the impact of click fraud isn’t just financial. Click fraud skews performance metrics such as click-through rate (CTR), conversion rates, and engagement levels. It becomes hard to understand which one of your ad campaigns is genuinely effective, which in turn makes it hard to optimize your marketing strategies and focus on the campaigns that are winning while cutting those that are not.

Additionally, click fraud increases the number of clicks without increasing the actions you want your users to eventually take, which means that it decreases the return on investment (ROI) of your marketing campaigns. Again, this can make it hard for your marketers to justify their ad spend while further confusing the most important advertising metrics.

How Google Addresses Click Fraud

Click fraud is a big problem for Google, because if companies notice that a substantial portion of their Google Ads budget is wasted on fraudulent clicks, they may decide to advertise elsewhere. Google may be the biggest search engine, but companies still have many other ways they can advertise, from ads on social media platforms to physical advertising.

 

Search may be the biggest source of ad spend in most countries, but there are many other avenues too

So it’s in Google’s best interests to protect their Google Ads from click fraud. To begin with, it’s important to note that you will not be not charged for any invalid traffic that Google discovers. If Google notices click fraud after the associated money has been deducted from your account, they will simply credit it back in the form of “invalid traffic credits.”

Google has a multi-layered approach to stopping click fraud: It has an automated system that uses Google’s algorithms to detect and filter out invalid clicks on Google Ads in real-time. These algorithms are designed to distinguish between genuine interactions and fraudulent ones. If that doesn’t suffice, Google also has a team of experts that are continuously searching for potentially invalid traffic.

More specifically, Google relies on several data points to figure out what’s invalid traffic and what’s not:

• IP addresses: Identifies repeated interactions from the same IP address.
• Interaction times: Tracks the timing and frequency of clicks.
• Duplicate interactions: Detects and filters out multiple clicks from the same source.

Additionally, Google offers companies the ability to request an invalid traffic investigation if they still believe there’s click fraud on their ads.

How to Identify Google Ads Click Fraud

But Google is predominantly a search engine. It’s not a cybersecurity company. Despite Google’s best attempts, companies still struggle with click fraud on Google Ads. That’s why it makes sense to understand what signs indicate click fraud, so you can proactively protect your Google Ads campaigns.

Monitor your campaign metrics: This is a best practice regardless of click fraud. You should always keep a close eye on key advertising metrics such as CTR and conversion rates. Click-through rates that spike but don’t lead to a corresponding increase in conversions can be a sign of fraudulent activity.

Examine IP addresses: There’s a reason Google looks at IP addresses to identify invalid traffic. Because multiple clicks coming from the same IP address within a short period can be an indicator of fraudulent behavior. Just be aware that legitimate users sometimes share the same IP, so consider it alongside other factors.

Analyze your bounce rates and engagement rates: High bounce rates and low engagement rates can also be indicators of click fraud, especially if they’re out of line with your usual bounce rates and engagement rates. If users are clicking on your ads, but immediately leaving your website without doing anything else, it may suggest that traffic isn’t genuine.

Cross-reference Google Ads data: If there’s a difference between the number of clicks reported by Google Ads and the actual visits recorded in Google Analytics (or whatever web analytics service you use), it’s another reliable indicator of fraudulent activity. If you notice more clicks than visits or conversions, you may want to investigate further.

How to Prevent Google Ads Click Fraud

While Google does a reasonable job filtering out most invalid traffic, fraudsters also don’t rest on their laurels. They’re always looking for new ways to punch through Google’s defenses. That’s why, to begin with, you should conduct regular audits of your ad traffic and adjust your targeting settings to minimize exposure to high-risk areas or countries you don’t do business in.

Additionally, as suggested by this Redditor, you can reduce click fraud by limiting your campaigns to Google’s Search Network. Don’t use their Display Network. And if you really want to use the Display Network too (which is understandable given its size), use a different landing page for it and add a CAPTCHA. You will also have less click fraud if you stay away from Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns and stick to Exact and Phrase Match campaigns.

But your best line of defense, one that will protect you against all types of click fraud, is an automated click fraud solution. Ideally created by a company focused entirely on detecting and preventing malicious bot traffic. Software that can immediately detect automated clicks on your ads and filter them out before they can do any damage.

That’s what DataDome Ad Protect does. It uses multi-layered machine learning techniques to analyze five trillion signals every day, to protect your advertising campaigns from click fraud. Integrating the software can be done both on client- and server-side without having to adjust your existing tech stack. DataDome Ad Protect has unparalleled accuracy and takes only a few minutes to set up. It’s the fastest and easiest way to prevent click fraud.

No More Click Fraud

Click fraud is a persistent and evolving challenge for digital advertisers, especially on platforms as large and influential as Google Ads. While Google has implemented robust measures to combat fraudulent activity, the sophistication of click fraudsters means that businesses cannot rely on Google’s defenses alone.

By understanding the signs of click fraud, regularly auditing ad traffic, limiting your campaigns to Google’s Search Network, and employing advanced PPC protection solutions like DataDome Ad Protect, companies can protect their advertising budgets and ensure that their campaigns are reaching genuine audiences. When every click counts, proactive protection against click fraud is what will get the best use out of your advertising budget.