Introduction
With the rise of the internet generation, the fraud on digital ads has been ever increasing. It became a significant problem in Google’s ecosystem when publishers started using artificial methods to increase ad revenue.
It led to increased clicks and costs for the advertisers, which did not realize actual revenues. This practice in the AdTech industry is termed an Invalid Activity.
All the app publishers would face some form of invalid activity over time, irrespective of their size. While the cause of these invalid activities might not be deliberate, it can damage an app’s or website’s reputation and even lead to account suspension with Google or other ad partners.
Invalid Activity is a threat to all the publishers looking to generate ad revenue by selling their ad space.
This article will dig into what invalid activity is, the causes of invalid activity, and how publishers can prevent their apps or website.
What is Invalid Activity?
Invalid activity is a practice that artificially increases the publisher’s earnings or the advertiser’s spending on any ad platform. It has become one of the prime reasons for publishers getting banned on Google AdSense, Google AdMob, and Google AdX.
Google defines invalid activity as – “any interaction that doesn’t come from real people with a real interest in an ad“.
While some of these activities are done deliberately through botnets or other advertisers who click on ads to waste their competitors’ budgets. Some invalid traffic is accidental, like a poorly implemented ad getting in the way of something the user is trying to click.
For an advertiser, invalid clicks don’t lead to genuine revenue, making their ad spent worthless. It prompts the advertisers to pull their budget from their ad spent.
Typically invalid traffic includes:
- Self-clicking by publishers on their app or website
- Automated tools used by publishers to increase impressions
- Bot traffic to spam an app or website
Whatever the cause is, invalid activity affects the entire ecosystem as the advertisers would choose not to spend more on Google Ads, leading to lower demand for Google Admob, Google AdX, and AdSense publishers.
It further reduces the average eCPM for publishers yielding lower revenue for them. Hence, publishers need to know how to identify and mitigate invalid traffic.
How does Google detect Invalid Traffic?
Google uses both human efforts and automated systems to detect invalid traffic. Hence, it is crucial to constantly monitor your app’s traffic and inspect your ad implementation to keep your apps free from Invalid Activity.
Google states that they also look at numerous data points for each ad interaction, such as:
- IP address
- Time of interaction
- Duplicate interactions
After examining various interaction patterns, Google tries to filter out potentially invalid interactions before they even appear in your account.
A typical example of this is what Google calls “Confirmed Click“. When a user clicks an ad with Confirmed Click, they will be asked to confirm their intent to visit the advertiser page by clicking a button associated with an action, such as “Visit site“.
Causes of Invalid Traffic
Invalid Activity can happen either accidentally or deliberately. Below are a few examples of invalid activity explained by Google. Please note that this is not an exhaustive list.
1. Invalid User Activity
Invalid user activity is when a real person interacts with an ad, but not out of actual interest.
It may include accidental clicks, but others are intentional and sometimes downright fraudulent. Some examples are: paying your users to click on ads, watch a video or engage with content they would not normally engage with to increase the ad impressions.
These activities create no value for the advertisers and are hence considered invalid.
2. Accidental Clicks
As the name suggests, this happens when users don’t intend to click on an ad. It occurs primarily due to poor ad placement.
Some examples include users clicking on ads disguised as the app’s content or an ad placed at a place where users are supposed to click to navigate through the app.
3. Ad Hiding
Ad hiding is when ads are placed in ways that make them impossible to see under normal circumstances. Some examples are ads tucked under iframes, hidden behind the content, hidden behind other ads(also called Ad Stacking), or using an invisible ad unit over a web page element(also called Clickjacking).
Source: Google
4. Ad Injection
Ad injections happen when ads are inserted into pages without the publisher’s knowledge. These are often created by browser plugins and software bundles. This type of attack also steals revenue from publishers.
5. Botnets
Botnets are automated software programs that run on Internet servers or hijacked computers. They create a large volume of invalid impressions, clicks, and traffic programmed to act like real users, which makes their traffic difficult to spot.
6. Falsely Represented Inventory
Falsely represented inventory is based on ad traffic falsely portrayed as coming from high-value users or a site claiming it is a different site. For example, using a VPN inside a non-VPN app to trick the advertisers into thinking the user is from another country.
7. Malware
Malware can infect mobile devices to generate various types of fraudulent traffic. This traffic can include hidden ads served in the background (without the user’s knowledge) and interstitial ads injected and abruptly displayed over a user interface.
How can you prevent Invalid Activity?
Invalid Traffic is a black box to publishers who are not engaging in this activity deliberately. Although here are a few ways to study your app’s traffic and ways to avoid Invalid Traffic:
1. Inspect your traffic source & Study User Behaviour
As a publisher, you must constantly inspect your traffic from different channels and sources. You can also break down these sources into various segments and understand the user behavior of each traffic source. If you find any anomaly from any source, you know a potential cause of invalid traffic now.
2. Use Test Devices
Many publishers click on their own ads while checking their app or its ad implementation. Instead, use test ads or a test device. You can even use the Google Publisher Toolbar for your websites.
3. Check your Ad Implementation and Policy Compliance
Please make sure you double-check your ad implementation and ensure they comply with Google’s policy. Also, you must avoid any programming errors and ensure that your app interacts appropriately with different devices and operating systems. Well-implemented ad placement can protect you from accidental clicks.
4. Check the Ad Review Center
You can also check and block any suspicious referral URL source. You can also limit the types of ads that can appear on your app using blocking controls by categories, advertiser URLs, or blocking ads via the Ad Review Center.
Tips and Tricks to avoid Invalid Traffic Concerns
After working with 100s of app publishers around the globe, we have figured that there is no straightforward way to resolve invalid traffic concerns. Although, you can try a few hit-and-trial methods to determine if something works for you. Some of them are listed below:
1. Control your CTRs
If you are facing an invalid traffic concern, check if your overall app’s CTR is below 5% and your ad unit’s CTR is below 15%. If not, try lowering the CTR by increasing the ad refresh rate or setting a frequency cap per user.
If you still can’t find a solution, please reach out to our policy experts for a solution.
2. Remove your Ad units
Try removing your ad units if you can’t reinstate your AdMob/AdSense account. If possible, figure out a problematic ad placement or an ad unit and disable the ads on them or deactivate the ad unit.
Although these may work for some apps, they may not work for others. These are hacks to resolve the ad limit of your AdMob or AdSense, but the root cause of invalid activity might still prevail in your app.
Conclusion:
Invalid Traffic Activity is a nightmare for any app publisher. It can hamper a significant source of your ad revenue and even lead to major deductions on your ad earnings.
The above information is a good start to protecting your app business from ad fraud and invalid traffic, but these are not enough. You need sophisticated technology and expert experience to help you sail through your ad limits and prevent them from happening again.
At AppBroda, we help publishers like you to avoid critical policy violations and stay compliant with Google’s policies. Our monetization experts help you increase your ad revenue and let you focus on what you do the best – creating great apps!
So, don’t wait for another policy violation. Book a free consultation right now!
