Google will probably switch to CPA

by Darren McLaughlin

I thought about this some more, and this post is speculation. We’ve heard that Google has experimented with CPA (Cost Per Action), and I think I can understand why. CPA would be one way to deal with the escalating click-fraud troubles they’re having. CPA would be the one thing that would most please the advertisers, because they’d only pay when the visitor converted.

Lately Google has seemingly aimed changes they’ve made at the advertisers as well as publishers in an attempt to get rid of “low quality” clicks, etc. It’s like they’ve developed a complete bias about what pages convert. Their Smart Pricing has always been set up this way. The next evolution would be CPA or CPM, depending on the needs of the advertisers.

Google Adsense is getting closer to maturation every day. It’s been in service for quite some time, and so far banner blindness and the like hasn’t completely affected them, but it might happen over time.

There’s no telling for sure if a completely dramatic switch would occur, but I could see it happening if there’s enough trouble with lawsuits.