There has been a lot of talk recently about click fraud rates. Advertisers think they are being gouged by search engines, the engines deny it, and consumers don’t really care either way, as long as they are getting relevant results and minimizing the time they have to spend shopping online.

One alternative to traditional ppc is Turn.com a fully automated CPA or cost per action platform. According to them, they “blend site analysis, past performance, categories, audience, and over 60 other variables to select the most relevant graphical and text ads”. They also claim to be completely pay for performance in that the advertiser sets the bid price and pays only when a specified action occurs. Whether it’s a site visit, product purchase, email signup, or lead, the advertiser is in total control of both what they pay and when they pay it. I think this bears further investigation. If you are wasting 20% of your spend on fraud this platform could be very beneficial. Of course it is no alternative to being ranked in the natural search results, and in order to do that you need to have a blog and engage in blog linking.