Pay per click advertising, PPC search engine articles

If you purchased AdWords advertising between January 1, 2002 and the present, you are a class member in a class-action lawsuit in the Circuit Court of Miller County, Arkansas. If you didn't receive it already, you should be receiving an email shortly from clicksettlement@xmr3.com containing links to further information about the negotiated settlement and how you can claim an award of advertising credits under the settlement. For more information, see:

• clicksettlement.com
• Inside AdWords

There are some reports out there claiming that this email from clicksettlement@xmr3.com is a phishing scam–not so! It's legit, so if you feel you've been a victim of click fraud via AdWords, head over and read the legalese.

Benjamin Edelman, an anti-spyware activist from Harvard who first reported connections between Yahoo! PPC and spyware back in August 2005, has launched a suit against Yahoo! alleging that the search giant funds spyware via it's Overture PPC program and has profitted from misspelled domain names. Read more from eWeek.com.

Google has won its suit against Auction Experts, an AdSense partner publisher that Google accused of deliberate click fraud. Google alleged that Auctions Expert hired dozens of people to click on the site's ads, totalling upwards of $50,000 in click revenue. More information from WebProNews.

On June 24, Click Defense Inc. filed a lawsuit, which also seeks class action status, against Google claiming that the search engine giant has failed to protect users of its advertising program from click fraud.

As Nathan Weinberg of BlogNewsChannel points out, Click Defense's actions are curious given that they profit from click fraud–without it, they wouldn't have any services to sell. Publicity stunt or the act of a good samaritan looking out for AdWords clients everywhere?

FindWhat.com announced plans today to re-brand its online marketing and e-commerce properties together under three divisions, all with the Miva brand name. The re-brand is expected to be complete by the end of June, 2005.

The FindWhat and Espotting networks will become Miva Media. Miva's e-commerce services, based on Miva Merchant, will become Miva Small Business. Its desktop software business, formerly Comet Systems, will be known as Miva Direct, offering search-related applications. Beginning June 13, the company's NASDAQ ticker symbol will change to "MIVA".

For more information, please see the press release. 

Dallas, Texas attorneys Joel Fineberg, Dean Gresham and Stephen Malouf have launched a new website called Lost Clicks in order to find potential click fraud victims. From the home page of the new site:

"Click fraud is becoming a significant concern for advertisers who rely upon the Internet for sales… When search engines charge advertisers and collect revenues for these clicks, advertisers get cheated. We have filed a national class action in Miller County, Arkansas against a number of the major search engines alleging that they are collecting fees for PPC advertising they’re not providing… If you have information about click fraud, have not been given answers or your money back from the search engines for suspected click fraud or you suspect Click Fraud and need to investigate, e-mail us at info@lostclicks.com."

Google has launched a new blog aimed at providing helpful information to advertisers. Straight from their first entry, here are the topics that Inside AdSense will touch upon:

• Updates on system enhancements
• Thoughts on things that advertisers have been asking about
• Tips on getting the most from AdWords
• Details on useful tools
• Links to interesting articles

As a PPC advertiser, you'll probably want to bookmark this one: Inside AdWords

Further evidence of the inceasing reach of PPC marketing is illustrated by the recently announced partnership between PPC provider SearchFeed.com and the Canadian website building and hosting company, CityMax.

SearchFeed.com's PPC services will now be available through a new Power Tools feature of CityMax's customer interface, providing users with help marketing their CityMax-built websites.

Read the press release > 

BidVertiser.com is offering $10 in free clicks for a limited time. Some of the benefits they tout about their system include:

• You choose the sites where your ads appear
• Geographical targeting

It doesn't appear however that you can have a look at what sites are part of their network before you signup.

If you have used BidVertiser, please post comments about your experiences with their system.

Limited time offer: $10.00 worth of clicks from BidVertiser

Google announced today the launch of AdSense for Feeds in beta. PPC advertisers can now have their ads placed in RSS/Atom syndicated content feeds, and content publishers can earn revenue from placing these PPC ads in their feeds.

Until now, syndicated feeds have been a largely ad-less frontier. It will be interesting to observe how readers react to seeing ads in their favourite feeds, and if they respond with the torrent of clicks that publishers and Google are hoping for. 

Google has published a document outlining best practices for incorporating AdSense for Feeds into your feeds, and are now accepting applications from publishers who would like to participate in the beta program. 

For more information, please see Google Blog: Feed me.