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Sacked by a Google algorithm

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Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#131

Post by epoxyhockey »

davidw wrote: post #127
joshklein wrote: post #9

Relying on Google, or any other single source, for your income is the same as having an employer. This is just as true whether you run a Youtube channel or have a multimillion dollar B2B business with only one client (aka "boss"). Being in the content game is the easy part of the equation; ad sales is the hard part. You can take the easy road and join a network, making pennies on the dollar and potentially getting "s…

Anyone got advice on how to go out and do this? How to calculate fair prices?

Put AdSense on your site (if you haven't already been banned) and look at what ads are being displayed. Then, go and approach those advertisers directly.

For pricing, decide how you want to get paid. You have 3 basic choices: CPM (per 1000 ad/page views), CPC (per click) and CPA (per action, i.e. someone clicks your ad and then buys something from that site). The easiest for you will be CPM. So, set your prices low, like at $2 per 1000 ad views. Raise prices based on demand. My best piece of advice is that you will not get rich from one site. You need to have several websites making a few bucks a day to make a living.

Also, those advertisers are most likely advertising on other ad platforms as well. AdSense is king of CPC, but other sites specialize in CPM and CPA. Check out Commision Junction to get some ideas. There are many ad networks out there. And, if you want to run your own ad network, there is open source software to help you setup and manage that too.

Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#132

Post by zacharyz »

So if users clicking on ads without the intention of buying is click fraud - what about when a user accidentally opens one of those lame ads on a youtube video when they were actually trying to close the ad? I certainly had no intention of giving the advertiser any money and yet it probably registers on their end as a click.

Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#133

Post by dholowiski »

alex_c wrote: post #17

Seems like part of the problem is that YouTube revenue is tied together to revenue from AdSense for websites, even though the two services are affected by click fraud differently. Now Google is still making money from the author's popular YouTube videos, and he won't see a penny. The "correct" response would be to pull all his videos from YouTube, move them to a competing service, and write Google to let them know wh…

Now that his accounts have been suspended, can he even pull the videos from YouTube? He may have to send a dmca takedown notice just to stop YouTube from profiting off of his misery.

As an aside, now that he has been 'sacked' by google, google's making 100% of the advertising revenue from his videos instead of some lower amount. That's very convenient for google.

Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#134

Post by moultano »

qjz wrote: post #125
patio11 wrote: post #101

So, as an AdWords advertiser, here is my experience when someone gets "creative" with ways to encourage their audience to click on my ads: 1) I see a sudden spike in my daily spend and think "Yay, I'm going to get more customers!" 2) I go to Analytics and see a wave of people who spent seconds on the website and did not convert to the trial. 3) Google bills my credit card for hundreds of dollars. This has actually ha…

3) Google bills my credit card for hundreds of dollars. Did you complain? Were you issued a refund? I'm trying to understand how Google justifies withholding past earnings from the site owner and continuing to profit from the YouTube content. If they incur real costs from refunding advertisers, it makes some sense. But if they keep everyone's money, they have an incentive to abuse the system.

>and continuing to profit from the YouTube content.

I believe ads are only shown on youtube content with the permission of the copyright owner. There don't appear to be any ads on his videos at the moment.

Here's an example video of his: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Ma_hZ00Nqk&feature=playe...

Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#135

Post by BrandonM »

ryanto wrote: post #96

I don't get why everyone is so upset at Google here? The guy admits to committing click fraud and then gets shut down. As someone who spends a bit of money on adwords I am pretty happy to see Google is active in enforcing these policies.

But the vast majority of the seized funds are from a source that is demonstrably not click fraud (his Youtube videos). The author shows the injustice of Google's heavy-handed, binary method of labeling people fraudsters and taking thousands without a fair hearing.

Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#136

Post by jeromec »

Zak wrote: post #122
patio11 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm the last guy in line to apologize for Google's attitude with regards to customer service, but to the extent my cynical blackened heart beats for anyone, it is the kayaking guy (et al) who paid those thousands of dollars and received no service in return for it. They have kids to put through school and Christmas presents to buy, too. He got a real human to look into his account, incidentally, which I would have ki…

I'm having trouble understanding what rule he broke. He had some content with ads on it chosen by Google's algorithms. People clicked those ads, then didn't buy anything from the advertiser. How is that his fault? I don't mean this as a rhetorical question. I honestly want to know how someone with an ad-supported site can avoid such a situation. Edit: elsewhere in the comments, I see that he was telling his viewers t…

He also knew something was wrong with encouraging AdSense clicks as noted from the article:

I did get the odd subscriber sending me an email saying that he had clicked loads of adverts. This is called demon clicking. I would reply that I would prefer them to only click on adverts they were interested in.

I allow my subscribers to leave comments on the films. If one of them mentioned clicking on adverts to show their appreciation - well it’s a nice gesture, but I would edit their posting to remove the mention.

It sounds to me like he enjoyed his visitors padding his AdSense revenue, but took a look-the-other-way attitude to their getting click-happy. I'm sorry, but it sounds like he sacked himself. When you work for someone else you have little control over getting sacked. When you work for yourself you shoulder more responsibility and control of your fate (as many on HN know), which includes knowing the terms of partner agreements you enter into. It's not like Google buries their zero tolerance policy for fraudulent click behavior under hard to read fine print.

Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#137

Post by dhimes »

patio11 wrote: post #129
Zak wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm having trouble understanding what rule he broke. He had some content with ads on it chosen by Google's algorithms. People clicked those ads, then didn't buy anything from the advertiser. How is that his fault? I don't mean this as a rhetorical question. I honestly want to know how someone with an ad-supported site can avoid such a situation. Edit: elsewhere in the comments, I see that he was telling his viewers t…

The rule is "Don't directly or indirectly tell people to click on your ads." The reason for this is that loyal audiences will , if you tell them to click on ads, click on ads to support you. This is exactly what happened. The CTR goes through the roof, the advertisers get billed lots of money, and no commerce takes place.

Did you read the Mea Culpa? Unless Mr. Winter is lying, Zak's question still stands. It seems like there is a potential for injustice when the reviews are held in secret like they were. All Google put forth was that there was a risk of generating invalid [click] activity.

As one who, like you, pays for that invalid activity I am glad to see Google do what they can to stem it.

But it gets very serious in my mind when they can also take the cash from the account. They should be required to show explicitly their justification. If that means that their business has to change because their algorithms are exposed, so be it. What they are doing does not seem to be a fair business practice to me, and I worry about the precedent they are being allowed to set.

Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#138

Post by anigbrowl »

arn wrote: post #14

...long story... Oh yes, I was also running little blocks of adverts provided by Adsense and, yes, I told my subscribers that I got some money if they visited the websites of those advertisers – all of whom were interested in selling stuff to sailors. ...long story... In the end it was click-fraud-ish. There's a huge fear for those dependent on google adsense that they will get terminated out of the blue like this. T…

I can not agree. There is an enormous difference between click-farming and a courteous 'please support this site by considering the fine offerings of my advertisers.' Also, to cut off all his YouTube income because of a misreading of his pitch on a tiny subscription-driven site is BS - there's no sign that he abused YouTube in any way.

I appreciate that a more responsive feedback loop can be exploited by bad guys as easily as it can support good guys, but the approach Google has taken creates a greater incentive for the guy to pull his old material and create a new online identity than it does for him to correct the minor flaw in his marketing. It's easy to say 'don't ever encourage users to click on ads,' but half the appeal of niche sites like this to members is being able to have conversational contact with an individual whose work is especially admirable, or through which the member can live vicariously.

What's happening here is that a legitimate honest business model (subscriber sales for niche content, with a minor secondary revenue stream from ads) is being punished because of Google's inability to differentiate it from a dishonest business model. The huge fear you describe is a reflection of both the asymmetry between Google and the small advertiser, and of the difficulty in understanding exactly what behavior is in or out. Not everyone finds those contracts easy to read or understand, and Google is actually raising barriers to entry if it enforces them too rigidly and giving greater incentive to the black hats than the white hats. I strongly suspect that this is a limiting factor on Google's own revenue, which is stuck on a local maximum because Google itself is has a much lower tolerance for information asymmetry than it demands of its content providers.

Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#139

Post by epoxyhockey »

patio11 wrote: post #129
Zak wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm having trouble understanding what rule he broke. He had some content with ads on it chosen by Google's algorithms. People clicked those ads, then didn't buy anything from the advertiser. How is that his fault? I don't mean this as a rhetorical question. I honestly want to know how someone with an ad-supported site can avoid such a situation. Edit: elsewhere in the comments, I see that he was telling his viewers t…

The rule is "Don't directly or indirectly tell people to click on your ads." The reason for this is that loyal audiences will , if you tell them to click on ads, click on ads to support you. This is exactly what happened. The CTR goes through the roof, the advertisers get billed lots of money, and no commerce takes place.

It is obvious to you and me that a 6% CTR is supernaturally high, at least in my experience.

If Google's algorithms are so great as to detect AdSense "cheaters," why don't they just throttle down the CPC for "cheaters" down to 1 cent (or less)?

I think we're basically discovering that Google is defending their immature AdSense algorithms by banning users rather than adapting to different behaviors.

Re: Sacked by a Google algorithm

#140

Post by anigbrowl »

gscott wrote: post #121
EGreg wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While Google's customers ARE the advertisers and their first priority is to make sure they are protected, Google would sit up and do something if more website PUBLISHERS would complain. It's a business. However, as a practical issue, I fail to see any practical reason to disable the guy's revenue from YouTube videos, based on clicks from an unrelated site. Just stop counting the clicks on the site, Google!

He has control over those youtube videos, he should take them down, create all new accounts with his wifes information and then put up the truck videos and pretty soon youtube will put him back into advertising mix. For his other site, if I were him I would run Adbrite.com ads instead of Adwords ads.

Correct, and it's quite possible that Google is undermining its own interests by presenting such incentives.
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