Surfing Around the Traffic Exchanges

It seems that Tim Linden thinks that he is the security expert when it comes to Traffic Exchanges. He has recently written a post claiming that a halt page or a stop page is not going to stop the cheats.  His claim is that he checked with security industry experts but you gotta give Linden credit – he did not quote any sources.

Jon Olsen claims that if you announce to the world that you have cheat checks in place then the cheaters are going to have a try to beat the system. Well Jon, the good news happens to be that where they have tried to beat the system, they have been caught with their bot surfing and other methods of cheating.

It is not just about missing the bonus links or those silly questions that are asked in some exchanges, it is about stopping the bot surfers. Usually the cheats will choose the exchanges where they offer the most competitions. What that means is that a lot of members do stay away out of frustration with the cheaters. Yes, I have done the same thing, because if I see what looks like evidence of a cheater I will not surf that exchange until I know the person is gone.

Unfortunately some exchanges do not even show signs that they have cheat checks in place. In reality what this means for the surfer is that they have no guarantee that their sites are getting unique hits per day. It means that the credits are being wasted in that exchange. This is not good news for the average surfer, especially the free members.

So why is it that some traffic owners seem to have such a cavalier attitude towards this issue? Try and get them to talk about the issue and there is a wall of silence. Or when they do say something they show that they are in denial as far as cheaters being able to penetrate their exchanges. Why would they be in denial? Because it is all about traffic and making their numbers look good in order to encourage new members to believe that their sites will be seen by thousands of members every day.

Now I am not wanting to have a go at any particular exchange on this issue, especially since I have my own opinions on the matter. However, from the point of view of a surfer who does not have the income to be able to afford to upgrade in the exchanges that charge high monthly fees, I want to know that I am getting some results from my surfing. The truth is that if I surf 100 sites in an exchange that offers a 3:1 ratio then I only get 30 credits per 90 sites which is just not enough per day to get in decent advertising. I get a better result in a 2:1 exchange, than I do in the other kind of exchange. What is really disappointing is that these same exchanges tend to be rather stingy with bonus credits.

So, when an exchange offers some form of cheat check this means that the surfer can be reassured that something is being done to make sure that the exchange is one that is effective when it comes to advertising results. I do know that I have good results out of small exchanges, and also from the Logiscape exchanges but not so good out of some of the so called top exchanges. Others will say that they have had a different experience with those same exchanges and that they get good results out of the one exchange that is considered to be at the top. In other words it really depends upon what we are trying to advertise when it comes to getting results. However, when it comes to cheaters, the bot surfing will not bring results even if one is getting a better rank as a result of the number of views per day. If there are bot surfers in an exchange then you have to work really hard to make up the credits.

It is up to the traffic exchange industry to get their act together and to tackle the subject at a more serious level. The traffic exchange owners should be doing more to reassure their members that cheaters are being caught and that they are being suspended from the exchange. If they continue to do nothing then the membership will gradually bleed until the exchange is choked to death through lack of surfing. The exchanges that have halt pages or stop pages are at least attempting tackle the problem, and even if the cheats make the attempt they might think that they will not get caught, but in the end they do get caught.

Why then is it necessary to hide the fact that there has been an attempt to cheat the exchange? Perhaps it really is all about traffic statistics.