The Metrics View in Ads Defender goes one level deeper than the Accounts Dashboard, offering users a powerful tool to analyze, report, and interact with click fraud data on a granular level.
What is the Metrics View?
The Metrics View is a comprehensive reporting interface that enables users to:
Explore click fraud data beyond high-level summaries.
Analyze campaign performance at a granular level.
Customize date ranges for deeper insights (unlike the Accounts Dashboard, which operates on a fixed 30-day window).
Sort, filter, and export data for use in internal reports.
Key Features:
Tab-Based Navigation – Metrics View is organized into four main tabs, allowing users to switch between different data sets.
CSV Export Functionality – All data can be exported for further manipulation or inclusion in custom reports.
No Fixed Date Range – Users can select any date range, providing maximum flexibility for historical and long-term analysis.
Tabs in the Metrics View
Currently, there are four tabs in the Metrics View, each offering distinct insights:
Campaigns
IPs (Google Ads only)
Placements (Google Ads only)
Audiences
Campaigns Tab – Campaign-Level Analysis
The Campaigns Tab focuses on unqualified traffic at the campaign level. While the Accounts Dashboard covers data at the ad account level, the Campaigns Tab allows users to:
Break down traffic by individual campaign.
Understand how click fraud varies across campaigns.
Track performance fluctuations over time.
Layout of the Campaigns Tab
The Campaigns Tab consists of two main sections:
Visual Graph (Top Section):
A graphical representation of valid and unqualified clicks over time.
Green represents valid clicks, while red represents unqualified clicks.
This visualization helps users:
Identify trends in unqualified traffic.
Correlate spikes in fraudulent activity with overall traffic increases.
Analyze click fraud patterns over custom time periods (e.g., last week, 90 days, full year).
Table View (Bottom Section):
Displays campaign-level data in a sortable, filterable table.
Key metrics include:
Valid Clicks – Total number of clicks that were not flagged as unqualified.
Unqualified Clicks – Clicks identified as fraudulent or low-quality.
Unqualified Ratio – The percentage of total clicks that were flagged as unqualified.
Protection Methods – Indicates which protection methods (IP blocking, placement blocking, audience exclusions) are active for each campaign.
Analyzing Campaign Data in Metrics View
Use Cases for the Campaigns Tab:
Identify High-Risk Campaigns:
Sort by unqualified ratio to pinpoint campaigns most affected by fraudulent clicks for budget optimization.
Track Performance Over Time:
Select flexible date ranges (e.g., last quarter, full year) to evaluate long-term campaign performance.
Spot Correlations:
Visualize how unqualified traffic fluctuates alongside overall traffic patterns.
Sorting, Filtering, and Exporting Data
The Metrics View offers full flexibility in how data is analyzed and extracted. Users can customize the view to fit their specific needs.
Sorting Options:
Users can sort data in multiple ways to highlight key insights. The following are just examples of common sorting scenarios:
Decreasing Unqualified Ratio – Identify campaigns with the highest percentage of unqualified traffic.
Decreasing Valid Clicks – Highlight budget-heavy campaigns and their amount of fraudulent clicks.
Filtering Options:
Filters allow users to refine the data based on specific criteria. Below are examples of potential filters:
Campaign Name – Filter by specific campaign names to drill down into targeted data.
Click Threshold – View campaigns that exceed or fall below a certain number of valid or unqualified clicks.
Exporting Data:
All data within the Campaigns Tab can be exported as a CSV file, providing users with raw data for further analysis or integration into internal reporting and presentations. This export feature supports the filtering and sorting from Ads Defender, ensuring that users can extract exactly the data they need.
Why Use the Campaigns Tab?
Granular Reporting: Gain insights at the campaign level, allowing for more precise optimization strategies.
Custom Date Analysis: Track performance over any time frame to compare traffic patterns and protection performance across different periods.
Actionable Insights: Use sorting and filtering to identify underperforming or high-risk campaigns, allowing for quick adjustments to bidding strategies or targeting settings.
Best Practices for Campaign Analysis
Review Weekly: Regularly analyze campaign-level data to stay ahead of click fraud trends.
Focus on High-Risk Campaigns: Pay close attention to campaigns with high unqualified ratios and adjust ad targeting or placement strategies accordingly.
Use CSV Export for Reports: Download and incorporate Ads Defender data into internal reporting for broader performance reviews.
Correlate with Budget Changes: Monitor how budget shifts influence unqualified traffic at the campaign level to optimize ad spend.
IPs Tab – Tracking and Analyzing Unqualified IPs
The IPs Tab in Ads Defender's Metrics View is designed to provide granular insights into blocked and unqualified IP addresses. Like the Campaigns Tab, the IPs Tab is structured to offer both visual representation and detailed tabular data to help users track trends, understand click fraud sources, and assess the impact of Ads Defender’s protection methods.
Layout of the IPs Tab
The IPs Tab mirrors the structure of the Campaigns Tab with two main sections:
Visual Graph (Top Section):
A bar chart displays the number of IPs blocked per day over the selected date range.
Users can quickly identify spikes or drops in blocked IP activity, which could correlate with:
Budget increases or decreases.
Seasonal traffic shifts.
Changes in fraudulent or unqualified traffic patterns.
Table View (Bottom Section):
A comprehensive table lists all unqualified IPs detected by Ads Defender. This section breaks down essential details for each IP, including:
IP Address – The specific IP flagged as unqualified.
Location – Geographical origin of the IP.
Traffic Insights – The reason(s) the IP was marked as unqualified (e.g., automated interactions, data center traffic).
Device and Operating System – Information about the device type (mobile/desktop) and OS used by the source of the traffic.
Replaced Clicks – The number of clicks prevented or "replaced" by blocking the IP. This gives users a sense of how much potential fraudulent traffic was avoided.
Using the IPs Tab for Analysis
The IPs Tab allows for detailed analysis of individual IPs and overall traffic patterns, making it easier to detect threats, refine targeting strategies, and ensure the continued effectiveness of protection measures.
Key Use Cases:
Identify High-Risk IPs:
Review IPs with the highest replaced click counts to understand which fraudulent sources contributed the most invalid traffic.
Track Blocking Trends Over Time:
Monitor spikes or drops in blocked IPs to identify correlations with budget changes or emerging threats.
Assess Effectiveness of Protection Methods:
If IP blocking suddenly drops, it may indicate protection interruptions or lower fraudulent traffic levels.
Sorting, Filtering, and Exporting IP Data
Like the Campaigns Tab, the IPs Tab offers full flexibility in how data can be organized and extracted.
Sorting Options (Examples):
Replaced Clicks (Descending): Sort IPs to identify those responsible for the highest volume of savings.
Location-Based Sorting: Sort by country or region to spot geographic trends in click fraud.
Filtering Options (Examples):
By Traffic Type:
Filter to view IPs flagged for automated interactions (bots).
Show only IPs associated with data center traffic.
By Device Type:
Focus on fraudulent activity from desktop or mobile traffic.
Exporting Data:
Full Export: Download a complete list of unqualified IPs in CSV format for internal analysis or external use.
Filtered Export: Apply filters to create lists of specific IP categories (e.g., bot IPs) and export those lists.
Placements Tab – Monitoring and Managing Blocked Placements
The Placements Tab in Ads Defender’s Metrics View offers detailed insights into unqualified ad placements across websites and apps. This tab helps users track fraudulent or low-quality placements that are automatically excluded by Ads Defender’s protection methods. Like the Campaigns and IPs tabs, it is structured to provide visual data and a comprehensive table view for deeper analysis.
Layout of the Placements Tab
The Placements Tab is structured similarly to the IPs and Campaigns tabs, with two primary sections:
Visual Graph (Top Section):
A bar chart displays the number of placements blocked per day over the selected date range.
Important Note:
The data reflects newly added placements to the block list during the selected time period – not the total size of the block list.
This allows users to monitor how fraudulent placement activity fluctuates over time.
Table View (Bottom Section):
A detailed table lists unqualified placements detected and blocked by Ads Defender. The table only displays fraudulent or low-quality placements, not the total list of placements.
For each placement, users can see key details, including:
Placement (Website or App): The domain or app of the unqualified placement.
Type: Indicates if the placement is a website or app.
Traffic Insights: Provides the specific reason the placement was flagged, categorized by:
Traffic Assessment: Indicates the placement attracted suspicious traffic patterns, such as bot clicks or data center interactions.
Quality Assessment: Flags placements with characteristics common to fraudulent sites, such as lack of SSL, excessive ads, or recently registered domains.
Scope: Displays the reach of the placement across Ads Defender’s ecosystem:
Unique to Account – Placement only appears in the current ad account.
Seen in Other Accounts – Placement is detected in multiple ad accounts within the same workspace.
Seen in Other Workspaces – Placement is flagged across multiple customers’ workspaces, indicating broader fraudulent activity.
Whitelist Toggle: Allows users to manually override Ads Defender’s decision and whitelist specific placements.
Using the Placements Tab for Analysis
The Placements Tab provides valuable insights for monitoring fraudulent placements and offers the flexibility to adapt Ads Defender’s protection settings as needed.
Key Use Cases:
Track Fraudulent Trends Over Time:
Identify spikes or drops in blocked placements to detect evolving threats or shifts in ad performance.
Understand Placement Risk Factors:
Use Traffic Insights to determine why certain placements are flagged and assess whether they align with known fraudulent patterns.
Scope-Based Prioritization:
Focus attention on placements marked as “seen in other workspaces,” as these are more likely to represent large-scale fraudulent operations.
Sorting, Filtering, and Exporting Placement Data
Sorting Options (Examples):
By Scope: Sort placements to prioritize those seen across multiple workspaces (indicative of cross-account fraud).
Filtering Options (Examples):
By Type: Filter placements to focus on either websites or apps.
By Reason (Traffic vs. Quality): Isolate placements flagged due to suspicious traffic patterns or those with low-quality site characteristics.
Exporting Data:
CSV Export:
Placements can be exported as a CSV file, preserving all applied filters and sort options.
This allows users to download customized lists of fraudulent placements for internal reporting or third party use.
Filtered Exports:
Create and export filtered lists to focus on specific placement types, traffic reasons, or geographic regions.
Best Practices for Placement Analysis
Review Placements Regularly:
Check placement data to track emerging fraudulent sites or apps as they are blocked automatically.
Investigate Cross-Account Fraud:
Pay close attention to placements flagged as “seen in other workspaces.” These often indicate systemic fraudulent activity across multiple customers.
Export for Collaboration:
Export placement data to collaborate with external agencies or partners to block fraudulent placements across different platforms.
Audiences Tab – Monitoring Audience List Size
The Audiences Tab in Ads Defender’s Metrics View is slightly different from the other tabs. This is because audience protection operates on a different mechanism compared to IP or placement blocking. The Audiences Tab reflects the size of excluded audience lists rather than individual user data, offering a privacy-first approach to audience-based protection.
How Audience Protection Works
Ads Defender leverages the ad platforms' native infrastructure to create and manage exclusion lists, ensuring that:
No direct user data or user IDs are handled by Ads Defender.
Ads Defender can only observe the size of the exclusion lists without visibility into the identities of users on the lists.
Layout of the Audiences Tab
Unlike the other tabs, the Audiences Tab consists of a single visual chart – there is no table or IP-level view. This bar chart tracks the total size of the excluded audience list over a selected date range.
Key Aspects of the Visual Chart:
Total List Size:
The chart displays the total audience list size per day, rather than the daily additions to the list.
Separate Lists for Display and Search:
Google Ads Accounts: Two bars appear each day:
Display Audience List Size
Search Audience List Size
Meta Ads Accounts: Only one audience list type is tracked, as Meta does not differentiate between search and display exclusions.
Threshold Indicators:
The chart includes visual thresholds representing the minimum list sizes required for audience exclusion to take effect:
100 users for display campaigns (Google and Meta)
1,000 users for search campaigns (Google)
300 Users for Microsoft Ads
Gray Bars: When the audience list is below the minimum size threshold, the bar appears gray, indicating that the list exists but is not yet eligible for exclusion or protection.
Colored Bars: When the list crosses the minimum threshold, the bar turns green (account-level) or purple (Google Ads list on conversion manager-level).
Case: Cross-Account Conversion Tracking (Google Ads)
In Google Ads accounts with cross-account conversion tracking, Ads Defender uses the conversion manager to build audience lists.
Visualization:
If an account transitions from account-specific lists to conversion manager lists, the color of the bar will shift:
Green Bars – Account-specific audience lists.
Purple Bars – Conversion manager-level lists (cross-account).
This provides a clear visual cue for users to track the migration process.
Key Use Cases of the Audiences Tab
Monitor Audience List Growth:
Track how audience lists expand over time, reflecting the effectiveness of audience-based exclusions.
Ensure Eligibility for Protection:
Regularly check that audience sizes meet the minimum thresholds required for ad platform exclusions to take effect.
Gray bars signal when lists are too small to influence campaign performance, prompting action to increase exclusion list size.
Cross-Account Visualization:
For Google Ads accounts using conversion managers, monitor whether the audience lists are account-specific or cross-account based on bar color changes.
Why Use the Audiences Tab?
Ensure Audience Lists Meet Platform Requirements:
Quickly determine if audiences meet the eligibility thresholds for protection on Google Ads, Microsoft Ads and Meta Ads.
Track List Growth Over Time:
Understand how audience lists develop over time and during traffic or budget changes