Internet publishers are warned to be careful with the program Bidvertiser. We’ve been experimenting with them over the last 6 months and so far the earnings have been very poor, but more about that subject a bit further in the article. The one thing that has been discovered is that Bidvertiser is hiding cloaked links on publishers sites. The way they are doing this is through use of the <noscript> tag in each Bidvertiser advertising block. We noticed a discrepency when one ad block we have in rotation had a link to Bidvertiser in a <noscript> bock that had the anchor text “Marketing” and another had the anchor text “Affiliate Program”. This shows they know they are using the black hat cloaking technique and that they are specifically targeting keywords based on the site the ads will be published on. Furthermore, the use of a <noscript> block in their javascript ad code is useless from a publishers perspective, however, a search engine spider will pick up the links in the <noscript> section and interpert them as a backlink. If Bidvertiser were doing this in a legitimate manner (for which there is no reason to begin with) they would add a nofollow tag to the link but they are not doing so.
This is not the only manner in which Bidvertiser is dishonest. As far as impressions, clicks and earnings per click, they are also cheating publishers and the word is getting out on all of the important webmaster forums. After reading numerous complaints, we decided to do an experiment of our own and we placed Bidvertiser on a few selected subpages on one of our highest traffic websites. Those subpages normally account for 1000+ pageviews per day when Adsense code, AdBrite, or Ads-Click code is placed on them. We also placed a Commission Junction (who is known for accurate tracking) ad block onthe same page as the Bidvertiser. Well, the Bidvertiser impression count was significantly lower than the Commission Junction count. If Bidvertiser can’t accurately track impressions, how on earth can they track clicks accurately. Secondly, Bidvertiser claims to allow the publisher to set their own pricing for clicks by choosing to “Manually approve ads”. When you manually approve ads, you are shown the ad and the CPC (cost per click) and are asked to approve or reject the ads. Iin our experiment, we selected only high priced ads, that had a value over$0.50 per click. The pages we tested on delivered a mere 5 clicks for 19,282 impressions with an earnings of $0.24 and a measley 0.03% CTR. The overall CPC was $0.05, but if we set our minimum CPC at $0.50, what happened? Evidently manually approving ads doesn’t work or Bidvertiser is just dishonest and cheating publishers.
The final straw with Bidvertiser is their referral program. We have been displaying the “Join Bidvertiser” banners on several sites for a number of months now and we have over 400 clicks (although our click-off tracking script says closer to 4,000 clicks) and only 3 signups. This is a blatant dishonest accounting on Bidvertisers part because I can personally name at least 10 bloggers and webmasters who have signed up to Bidvertiser through our referral links because of my activity at DigitalPoint and Code4Gold forums.
As of this post, we are currently removing Bidvertiser from all of our sites and giving them a bigh thumbs down for their dishonesty. It would be nice if there were more legitimate, honest affiliate programs out there that didn’t cheat, lie to or steal from publishers but for the most part, the majority of PPC networks are nothing but con games. Either a publisher gets banned right before they get paid or they get cheated and lied to.
10 Responses to 'Bidvertiser Dishonest - Hiding Cloaked Links and Cheating Publishers'
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You need to be careful on sending trackbacks to blogs when you don’t include a link to the post. I picked it up manually in Spam Karma, but if I happened not to pull it out of the sin bin, the penalties can snowball to an extent that further links or trackbacks will be beyond default thresholds and become invisible from normal moderation.
-8.75: Trackback Source Site (http://www.affiliatebestprograms.com/2008/01/21/bidvertiser-dishonest-hiding-cloaked-links-and-cheating-publishers/) does not contain Blog URL domain (andybeard.eu).
As to Bidvertiser, I think the highest success people have with them is on sites which you don’t want to use other forms of advertising. I actually ran them for a little while as a test, and impression counts weren’t too far off - click rate was terrible.
The noscript trick is used by loads of sites - it isn’t blackhat, just smart, as such links could be looked on as good for usability - it becomes more naughty where the link isn’t related to the owner of the widget or advert, or when you are not allowed to remove the link.
I know that Bidvertiser are using it to dominate search results, but they are certainly not the first - you have a link to wordpress, if you install akismet along with the spam counter widget, you would have a link to akismet as well - add a technorati authority badge, you have a link to Technorati that is modified with javascript and css to display as an image.. but it is actually a text link.
Then you have all the form buttons for adding a feed - those can pass juice
I’m having similar problem with Bidvertiser . I only choose approved clicks of specific value and get only few pennies per click.
Hi Andy, I have your site on my blogroll and I was testing an experimental plugin created by a friend that goes through your blogroll to find *friends* with similar posts and pings them. I’ve just removed it because it was going haywire.
As far as Bidvertiser and the cloaked links in the noscript, isn’t it just a poor business practice to essentially hide a anchor text targeted link on a publishers site ? I proudly link to Wordpress because they are providing me with free sorftware, therefor they deserve the link. I also link to Technorati because they provide me with traffic. However, when I use CJ (Commission Junction) ads I always add a nofollow and a target=_blank to the links. I do the same with almost all CPA and CPM ads if they are not coded in JavaScript. With Bidvertiser, I carelessly assumed because it was in Javascript, the noscript would not be counted as a backlink.
I wonder what Google and Matt Cutts position is on this (not that I really care) but if their “spam fighting” team can detect PayPerPost bloggers and dofollow blogs, you’d thing the geniuses at the ‘plex would have devalued links in noscript text?
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Thanks for the heads up.
This is quite despicable and I have of recent become quite sickened at sub-standard services of the various affiliates out there, be they ppc or eCPM of CPA or whatever, they all become a little more sleazy in their manner within 3 months.
You mention ‘dofollow’ blogs are you saying they are hitting hard on dofollow or maybe the amount of links advertised in your right column.
I do believe it may be the latter
As far as I know, dofollow blogs are not being penalized. As far as any advertising links on your blogs sidebar, just apply a nofollow tag to them and you should be fine.
What ever you say folks, I got my 1500 USD this month by using BidVertiser 7th Click Wonder. Open my site…. click on BidVerTiser Advertisemnt, after 7 clicks you will see a furniture company add worth of 17CPC, go ahead
Hello, been looking for posts about adwords pricing and other options for CPC campaigns. I found your blog post about Bidvertiser being dishonest - Are they safe to use for CPC campaign?
I read similar article also named iser Dishonest - Hiding Cloaked Links and Cheating Publishers, and it was completely different. Personally, I agree with you more, because this article makes a little bit more sense for me