Affiliate Advertisers Beware

Some shady tactics have recently been catching on among affiliate publishers to generate lead volume. If you advertise through affiliate networks, now would be a good time to ramp up your tracking efforts to make sure you are receiving quality leads.

Because of the high unemployment rate, people are looking very hard for jobs. Affiliate publishers are taking full advantage of this misfortune by providing job seekers with false hope in order to acquire their personal information. They are doing this by posting job listings on Craigslist and other classified ad platforms that require potential candidates to fill out offers as a “test” to get a job as a “website functionality tester”. The forms they are given to fill out are in fact those of the advertiser, qualifying as a valid lead. Of course this fraudulent tactic not only hurts the advertisers by forcing them to pay for false leads, it also hurts the job seeker by wasting their precious job-hunting time filling out forms that will provide no benefit to them.

If you are advertising through an affiliate program, dig deep into your tracking system to see how leads are being generated to ensure you are not a victim of this popular new trend. If you are looking for a job, think twice before taking any “tests” to become a website functionality tester.