Why Real-Time Ad Fraud Detection and Prevention Matters
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You are probably beyond the stage of wondering what exactly ad fraud is and what mobile ad fraud is and now want to decide which ad fraud protection strategy is best for your business. Our reports predict that 44% of global ad spend in 2020 will go to ad fraud. Thus, there is not a better time than now to get a handle on ad fraud protection. We’re taking an in-depth look into the real-time aspect of mobile ad fraud protection, detection, and prevention, including what real-time protection is, how it benefits you, and the difference between online and offline protection.
In this article/
- What is real-time ad fraud protection?
- What is offline ad fraud protection?
- Who does real-time versus offline?
- Why real-time protection matters
What is Real-Time Ad Fraud Protection
Real-time ad fraud protection is when ad fraud is prevented before that action is paid for. It is synonymous with real-time ad fraud detection and real-time ad fraud prevention. The ‘blocked’ action will take numerous forms, depending on the type of ad campaign you are auditing. It could take the form of blocked clicks that would have turned into installs, or blocks sub-publishers that may have become paid impressions or clicks.
In Interceptd’s case, we get inside the re-direction path of the CPA and CPI campaigns. If mobile ad fraud is detected, we then stop/do not redirect them to the external destination of those fraudulent clicks before it reaches the App Store or Google Play, thus blocking the fraudulent install.
What Is Offline Ad Fraud Protection
Offline protection is a very different type of ad fraud protection. It involves analyzing data, and if ad fraud is detected, then the customer must ask for a refund from the fraudulent source. This contrasts with real-time ad fraud protection that prevents fraudulent action from happening before it is attributed or paid for. Many third-party and MMP providers offer this offline protection (click here to go straight to our competitor comparison list). There are two types of offline protection.
With Real-Time Data
This is ‘the better of the two evils’ option, as the information they are analyzing is in real-time. However, no prevention or blocking occurs, and fraudulent activity is allowed. Then, one must ask for a refund from either their ad network, DSP, or the other fraudulent source. This is obviously more time-consuming and laborious in terms of budget and data management.
With Historic Data
This is often the least ideal ad fraud protection option out of the three variants. It is when the ad fraud protection provider analyzes historical data after the campaign has been attributed or paid for and then evaluates the potential level of fraud. Generally, after that, a report is generated, and the customer must then go and seek refunds from the fraudulent sources. Again, this is the most laborious and time-consuming of the three ad fraud protection solution options, both in terms of managing one’s ad spend, but also in terms of cleaning the data of the incorrectly attributed organic and paid and fraudulent traffic.
Who Does Real-Time Versus Offline Ad Fraud Protection?
This is our comparison list with other independent ad fraud protection and prevention solutions as well as mobile measurement partners (MMPs) or attribution tools. If you’d like to see our full competitor comparison list, click here.
Why Real-Time Ad Fraud Protection Matters
Save time
While this is not the most significant benefit of real-time ad fraud protection, it is certainly the one that our customers appreciate the most. With many roles being hybridized, and the market and technology evolving rapidly, many professionals are stretched for time. Thus, many of our customers value how easy real-time ad fraud protection is. All the fraudulent and clean activity can easily be monitored from our dashboard in real-time. Setting up campaigns to be monitored is painless. We have a dedicated fraud consultant to help onboard and customize the ad fraud protection experience to your business. However, probably the best time-saving benefits come from our:
- Estimated savings tab, which is updated in real-time.
- Effective ROAS reports, which are easily generated. Have rare access to clean and reliable data you can trust.
- Fraud stopped in real-time.
Easier
Real-time ad fraud protection is easier, as there is no lengthy, arduous, and often awkward refund process. Some ad networks, DSPs, and other campaign sources are more receptive than others, with regards to processing refunds. Then there is also the processing time as well. Add onto that potential finance reporting amendments you have to make (worse if you’re with a publicly listed company), and all-in-all, what could have been prevented in real-time, now has possibly taken months of waiting and hours of work.
Save Money
The kicker is you save money. Sometimes, refunds do not always get approved. Additionally, with our real-time ad fraud protection, you can best optimize your spend, through a few functions:
- Optimize your clean traffic.
- Get access to clean data, from which to make better strategic marketing and advertising decisions.
- Blacklist low performing sub-publishers.
- Check out our event analytics and daily performance view, to gain insights into your campaign’s performance.
Final Thoughts of Real-time Ad fraud Protection
If you’re wondering how to stop ad fraud in the most cost-effective and painless way, then real-time is just one, but a critical aspect of ad fraud protection. There is also the algorithm accuracy that must be considered. Some providers are too aggressive or lenient when it comes to fraud. We find a combination of probabilistic and deterministic alarms is best, as it allows for the robust capabilities of our deterministic alarms to be supported with the flexibility of our probabilistic alarms, to give more accurate coverage. Many of our customers are not ad fraud experts, and thus, we offer a free ad fraud protection trial. We often encourage our customers to ‘challenge’ us to a head-to-head off with any of our competitors to fully test our ad fraud protection capabilities and get a full gauge on the impact our service can have on your marketing and advertising efforts.
