Business advertising

Pay-per-Click advertising has become increasingly popular, but how effective is it really?
What could be easier? You write a 3-line ad, set a budget, and pick some keywords for promoting your ad. Google and Yahoo do the rest! Your ad is automatically placed in the right places, your results are tracked and recorded, and your monthly budget is never exceeded. Pay-per-click (PPC) is an advertisers dream. Or is it?
In 2006, Google agreed to a $90 million settlement in response to a class action lawsuit that alleged they hadn't done enough to protect their advertisers from click fraud. Click fraud occurs when someone (usually a competitor) clicks on a PPC ad repeatedly to drive up that advertisers expense or max out their PPC budget, thereby eliminating that particular ad.
Make no mistake about it, click fraud exists. Anyone using pay-per-click services or hiring a pay-per-click firm should be aware that this is something that's very difficult to police. You can't count on the search engines to do it for you, or wait around for the next class action suit for your $4.50 credit (that's what Google had to "pay" to each of their advertisers for every $1,000 they had spent). You'll need to monitor your pay-per-click spend very closely. Unless you do, it could be very easy to fall victim to click fraud.