Is it Worth it Clicking on Your Own Ads?

By Paul on September 28th, 2008

It can be quite tempting to earn a few cents to click on your own advertisements put on your website. As long it is not too excessive, a little stream of income can flow towards you. However, does it pay to click on your own ads?

In Moneyning’s blog post, he talks about this subject of click on your own ads or even as he was invited to join a ’syndicate’ in clicking ads on a network of blogs to earn money.

I mean, clicking on your own ads is one thing but joining a group to cheat Google of its money? That’s atrocious.

Upon doing some reading up, clicking on your own hosted ads faces far greater risks. One thing is that your account can be banned and you will be blacklisted from using the ad provider in the future. (Remember that they have all your information including address when you signed up). And if the click fraud’s scale is large enough, you are liable to be sued as well.

But besides that, clicking on your own ads brings about some other disadvantages.

You screw up your performance tracking
Your channel that you stipulated will reflect a very inaccurate picture of how your ads are performing in a certain section of your website. This will hinder you from tweaking your site to be more ads optimal when you trial and error with the ads placement.
Google Does really watch you
Not only the performance tracking is screwed, Google’s proprietary system will adapt to the clicking patterns of your site to deliver the ads. Whilst clicking on the ads will bring you $$, you won’t know how much that does. In the long run, you might even screw the pattern up in someway that causes lower tiers of ads to go to you, generating less dollar per click.
It goes against your moral beliefs?
Cheating is cheating. Whilst you might use Robin Hood as an excuse, remember that clicking on ads in the long term will cause you to form a bad habit of reliance on the wrong things. And this can prevent you from being more innovative to really monetize from the ads you place on your website.

I guess the best guideline anyone can take away from clicking your own ads is to see your own site like someone else’s. If it is really really interesting to see what the ad is all about or by some careless mistake that you click on it, it’s fine. It’s only the intention and the overdoing it that labels clicking on your own ad as click fraud.

Remember, Google is watching.

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