Paid To Click
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Paid To Click
is an online business model that draws online traffic from people
aiming to earn money from home. Paid-To-Click, or simply PTC websites,
act as middlemen between advertisers and consumers; the advertiser pays
for displaying ads on the PTC website, and a part of this payment goes
to the viewer when he views the advertisement.
In addition, most PTC sites offer a commission to its members for signing up new members (similar to many
affiliate marketing programs online), or they may pay members a percentage of the clicks that their referrals make as an ongoing commission.
The viability of the PTC
business model has been questioned, as
fraudulent clicks have ramped up the expenses for advertisers.With lawsuits filed against the internet search companies, the burden has been placed on
Google,
Yahoo and others to determine valid clicks from fraudulent ones.
This should not be confused with PPC where advertiser pays the site per click generated from any user .
Even though advertisements are the most widely known method for PTC
sites to stay alive, much of the profit can come from the direct sales
of referrals or upgrade packages which are created by the owner of each
PTC site. This has led to the proliferation of online scams or
ponzi schemes
being created with PTC sites as a cover, as members are encouraged to
buy referrals that are not actually human or upgrade packages that offer
no real value. As well, some sites
may request that their users pay an "upgrade fee" before being able to
cash out their earnings, and then not paying out earnings after these
fees are paid.
Scams, although exposed on various PTC forums, are still heavily used
by newcomers who are drawn in to the websites by search engines. Scam
PTC sites are known to attract new users with cheap offers for upgrades
and referrals and disappear without trace after a short time.
