I cannot and will not post the exact details of this test, but if anyone doubts the valdity of any "tests" I run, here is one that is IMO worth a lot of money to anyone that deals in traffic.

http://chickentraffic.com/test.htm

I run very controlled tests. Results from this one were very surpising to me.

1. Most non-english surfers click on English sites more than English surfers do. They are more trusting.

2. Asian surfers DO NOT click like crazy like everyone thinks.

3. Eastern Europe and Arab surfers do click like crazy on English sites.

Anyone who has half a brain can see and realize the value of this test. Use it if you want, if not that's fine too.

yup and when a sponsor wants you to send them traffic.. they won't let you login directly to epoch and still get that 40$ a sign up because "our system doesn't work like that" which is bull shit.. takes 10 seconds to setup a reseller account at epoch to make sure there is no shaving :BangBang:

The way I see it, they have 2 ways of getting traffice, from affiliates and to purchase it, were else? If they purchase, cost goes up and they gamble were as with affiliates, well they know it works.

I don't often agree with KK but what she is suggesting has been on the horizon for a while.

Affiliates are not much more than middle men these days - in the middle between those who control the traffic and those who have what the traffic wants.

Pretty soon, if we aren't there already, it will make more economic sense for the paysite owners to deal directly with the those who have the traffic.

Not only will they be increasing their bottom line but they will also kill one of their major fraud problems - affiliate fraud.

I am with you man, this is EXACTLY what I thought, before these results were brought to my attention by affiliates.

Trust me Tipsy, I never took the 1 in 200 clam as real.... that's the signal to move along.

If you had 200 visitors to your new sit and got lucky, then you have a ratio of 1 in 200 - great.

Well the boards offer a lot of bull no argument there, but here we both sit... Think I'll get back to something more creative for now.

Got to be fair to GFY... with all the BS, ya still learn something and there is the entertainment value...

I see you still hang out at the playground. :1orglaugh

Just to add to my above posts as they seem to take a stance that shaving isn't common my view is simply that those who believe that there is no shaving are as daft as those that believe that everyone does. The true figure lies somewhere in between and you have to work out for yourself what you believe it is. My own opinion of the figure I won't post on boards for much the same reason the Choker wont post names.

Choker:
On the names thing though....without looking back didn;t you say most rather than all the ones tested were suspicious? That being the case it could do no harm to name those which you think didn;t have suspicious stats. As nobody knows the sponsor list you used it won't adversly affect those you were worried about but will let people know the ones you are fairly certain are 'honest'. Surely they deserve a thumbs up?

Choker,

Why don't you make your own paysite program?
You have your own traffic, reliable hosting, you're organised...Why not create a whole paysite program?

Contact me, I have few ideas. Also I wanted to inquire about the traffic, I haven't bought from you because I don't own a paypal account, so I wanted to give your traffic a try in comparison to spotbroker's.

my icq is in the sig.

B

they click more cause they dont understand shit about english.

You are dead on it from every indication I've seen lately.

The affiliates who don't willingly commit fraud still cause way more chargebacks than traffic that is not affiliate brokered... and that is coming to be a huge issue very rapidly, since October 1 is not long on the horizon.

Sure - that wasn't aimed at you. Just at the idiots who make fairly baseless accusations aimed at specific sponsors, often starting threads up just to throw the BS around. The sponsor they mention may or may not but the 'proof' is usually totally that persons inability to understand traffic and stats. Shame really as it would obviously be nice to know for sure who does and doesn't. No easy task though :)

why not run your tests with 100k worth of traffic. and have your script split the traffic bwtween the affiliate codes evenly.

so like

hit0 = codeA
hit1 = codeB
hit2 = codeA
hit3 = codeB
.
.
.
hitN = codeA
nitN+1 = codeB

same traffic, same time, different affiliate codes 100k hits. that would be concrete enough for me. once you are done be sure to email me the affiliate programs you tried this with so i can blacklist them from any further promotions i do. also be sure to tell me which ones do not appear to be shaving so i can promote those harder.

i dont mind taking a pay cut, i can't stand being cheated.

/* removed out of pure respect - bret */

THANKS! Very worth while info. Not sure my state of mind is better for it though... Webalyzer does not reveal the detail you presented.

Choker, Interested in your opinion of Sextracker stats.

Yep. A superb example of how effective that can be is a quiet (sic) infamous poster on this board.

If the landsacpe in this business doesn't start changing even more radically over the next 12 months I'd be surprised. Mind you - it's also true that the companies that will benefit the most from doing something like that are the ones already running a very tight ship, i.e. quality sites without bs'ing the surfer. If any do start making the switch it will be interesting to see which.

First off, let's get the legal terms correct here. Slanderous statements are false and malicious accusations injurious to a person or company's reputation which are made orally to another party. Libelous statements are the same but are made in printed form i.e. posting on a message board like GFY.

But if the statements are true and factual it is not libel or slander.

Next, if you have faith in your test results there shouldn't be a reason not to post them. Your intent is not malicious in nature. A disclaimer can also be added to further insure your protection from liability for those results. Consumer Reports is the best example to compare what you've done Choker. Tests are tests. Just like car tests are car tests. As long as they are conducted professionally, using proven to be accurate methodologies, in an unbiased manner everything is kosher.

So post the results of your tests and let each webmaster be the judge. You aren't saying this company is a thief and that one is not. You are simply showing traffic counting results without any opinions added and there is nothing wrong with that.

Its very obvious in this industry you have two elements to consider. First its controlled by human beings not computers. Human beings are prone to dishonesty by nature. Second, computers are run by programs created by human beings and as such programs are succeptible to malicious coding intentionally designed to cheat others and sometimes unintentionally designed to cheat by erroneous coding. So to expect anything less than an environment where shaving can and does occur is foolhardy.

sextracker is for ego maniacs. I watch it basically for a good laugh. It's funny to watch the old timers pull their counter off their pages when their stats dip. Some sites use Sextracker to show prospective advertising clients thier numbers, that's a good reason to use Sextracker. Nothing against sextracker itself, it is the best 3rd party stats around.

I STRONGLY disagree. First this is a CIVIL matter not a criminal matter so the findings a court could conclude can and often does swing the way you least expect. If I posted that a sponsor was shaving and was unable to produce evidence that a court would consider 100% proof, that sponsor could most definatley use that ruling to sue my ass off for slander.

I meant with respect to reliability on stats... They offer a lot of info with respect to timezones, search engines, search phrase...


Sextracker, while not reproting near all the hits indicates most of my traffic comes form North America etc. And that I am not suffering that bad from foreign trafffic.

I spared no expense in using webalyzer too. Again showing most traffic for me to be from the good ole USA...

I doubt that there would be many judges today who could understand the finer points of hits, clicks, raws, uniques and tracking and that is where any case involving shaving would come down to.

100 whiney webmasters complaining about shaving.

Third party affiliate programs are NO PROTECTION against shaving. Consider the following two scenarios:

1). Your sponsor has two CCBill (or any third party system) accounts "A" and "B". The sponsor has an affiliate program on account "A". You send your clicks through CCBill's counter/cookie script using your affliate id from account "A". Your sponsor sends some of your traffic to account "A" and some to account "B". You get credit for only the signups on account "A". Anything that goes to account "B" you don't get credit for.

2). You send your clicks through CCBill's counter/cookie script, using your affiliate id. Then after your traffic hits your sponsor's site he redirects some of it back through the counter/cookie script under a different affiliate id before send it to his join page. You only get credited for all of your clicks but only some of your joins.

It took about two minutes to think up those two scenearios. There are probably several more, especially when you through multiple billing companies, payment methods, multiple sites, etc. into the mix. If a sponsor wants to shave you, you can't do anything to stop it. If you think third party is some magical solution you're an idiot.

The only way to limit your exposure to shaving is to shop your traffic around from one affiliate program to another until you find the one that pays you the most. Then continue shopping around
a portion of your traffic so you'll always know who will pay you the most at any given time.

ah, well when I use a third party counter, I use Sextracker. I liked hitbox stats better, but they changed thier stuff and it's popup hell now, even to see your stats there you get bombarded with consoles. I have found Webalizer to be useless.

Strongly agree whit Choker on this one! Not an attorney, but have spent a bit of time in court and put an ex through law school...

Not if you have a good legal team. :Graucho

Who said to state a sponsor is shaving?

All you're doing is stating counting results. I imagine you get a lot of webmasters who buy traffic and then bitch that the numbers aren't in perfect sync with what they show as receiving on their sponsor stats. And that was one of the reasons the tests were performed.

So what is there to fear if these tests are as accurate as you say they are?

As I said before. If they are true and honest you are not libeling any company just stating factual test results, that were performed in mass duplication to ensure their integrity.

I don't see what the problem is here.

Why post if you aren't willing to back up your claims in black and white for everyone to see and judge??

That might be so now but there are some analysts who are suggesting that computer sales and the take-up of internet access in the US may have just about reached its peak.

While the same figures for places outside the US just continue to grow and grow.

Correct
A court would ask me one thing...Where is your proof they are cheating you?

If I could not provide enough proof, I could be counter sued for slander.

ok...
We all know the people shave. Thats one thing.

What cocker has pointed out that many people are failing to see is that some people are shaved MORE than others.

HE has two referal codes. One sponsor. Same amount and souce of traffic.

Referal Code "A" reports in the stats a nicer ratio and more uniques...

Referal Code "B" reports a worse ratio and less uniques being reported.

Both with the same amout of traffic sent, and both sending to the exact same program.

This is what he is trying to say.

More the reason to join the Boneprone Family. If the sponsor knows you are family chances are they will give ya referal code A and not shave you like they do the B group...

Why?

Because we are BP4L bitch.

Bow to the Power.

More than likely its because the shave module is programmed to sync with the historical duration averages of the affiliate's membership sales.

So Affiliate A might average 4 months average re-bllings per subscriber

And Affiliate B might average 2 months average re-billings per subscriber.

So the code adjusts accordingly to balance things out.

How is it that so many in this thread totally missed that and started on about stuff like 2nd page clicks being counted? Oh well :)

it is amazing how few people actually understand the nature of his post.

the point is not that hits are not being counted, that can be for thousand if not tens of thousands of variables. the point is they are not being counted the SAME for the two seperate affiliate codes.

here is a simple example.

say i drop 10,000 (ten thousand) marbles out of my second story window into a large bucket being held by my partner, some will miss, some will bounce out, alot will get caught in his huge bucket. say a total of 7,500 marbles stay in the bucket.

now say i collect all 10,000 marbles run back up the stairs from the same window and drop them all again. this time a LARGE portion of the marbles do not stay in the bucket, this time i only collect 3,000 marbles in the bucket. after close examination i notice someone has replaced my first bucket with a second bucket, this one filled with giant holes.

same type of marbles, same window, same method of dropping them, two different buckets, one complete bucket, one with large holes in it.

this is the point he is trying to make. not the fact that all the marbles did not land in the bucket, but the fact that the first bucket caught a hell of alot more marbles then the second bucket. that is the problem, both buckets should catch roughly the same amount of marbles. but when one of the buckets has a bunch of holes in it, well, it hardly stands a chance.

Choker is having a hard time trying to explain 10 times the same thing. Just 5% orn less of the GFYers read and think before posting.

He is just said that when he sents traffic with his affiliate ID, the sponsor "TEST" counts about 90% of the hits sent and converts 1:1400.

Then lets say I join this same sponsor "TEST" and buy traffic from Choker. He just change his affiliate ID to mine and BAM, just 60% of the hits are counted and the ratio goes to 1:3000.

Looks like some guys are VIP or PREMIUM affiliates (no shaving)and the others have the shave machine turned on.

I would love to see a page with these tests (Choker's X any other affiliate ID)... if the sponsor looks his referer stats and see that the traffic is coming from Choker's program at least the affiliate who bought traffic from Choker will have his account changed to VIP or PREMIUM (no shaving) :Graucho .

Jer

Some smart posts while I was typing.

Thought of it and lots of guys have advised me to do this, hell I hold license to like over 200k pics, but making and running a paysite just does not apeal to me. As far as contacting you, I already did and am waiting on a icq back from you from 2 weeks ago.

Was just about to say that. it seems we all jumped at the same time.

this is what i've alwayse experienced.. that's why i started my own..

spam traffic: 20 - 40% shave of clicks and sign ups
webmaster getting 1 - 3 sign ups per day: 10 - 20% shave
webmaster getting 4 - 10 sign ups per day: 15% - 30% shave
webmaster getting 10+ sales per day: 20 - 30% shave with 2 - 3 days per week of 40% shave

LOL

lol

also seems to go by the time of the day.. first 1 or 2 sign ups come in quick after the new day starts.. then slows down.. then at night when the most sign ups should be rolling in.. they seem to not be anything big..

for 5 months with my sites i had the same traffic every day all day.. stayed at an average.. didn't jump around .. maybe + 5 - 10 sign ups that day or - 5 - 10 sign ups that day.. but 80% it was withing 5 sign ups difference.. if it's the same traffic it's not just going to die off 1 day.. never happened to me once

I shave all the time and you'll still make more with Pornkings then anyone else. LOL

at least you are honest.

please see my sig on another board.

"Compare apples to apples and see who sends the biggest check at the end of the day" - in response to me bitching about shaving to a sponsor.