The Hidden Ad Fraud Inflating CACs: How Hyper-Engaged Users Drain Budgets

Marketers are funnelling huge resources into digital campaigns to stand out in crowded markets and keep audiences hooked. What they don’t know is much of that ad spend is quietly going to waste.

Invalid traffic (IVT) is the root of this problem, quietly draining advertising budgets on a vast scale. Pixalate reports an 18% rise in IVT globally in Q1 2025 alone, and a 31% surge on mobile, highlighting the urgency of tackling this growing threat.

AI-based solutions have been rolled out to tackle IVT, but hyper-engaged users are a critical blind spot being overlooked. These can be real people, sometimes they do convert, sometimes they’re already existing customers, but their excessive clicking keeps retriggering paid campaigns. The impact is the same: budgets are drained, customer acquisition costs (CACs) climb, and marketers see spend that looks like performance but delivers little to no incremental value.

Not all engagement is good engagement. Until this blind spot is addressed, IVT will continue to quietly eat away at advertising efficiency.

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The Rise of Invalid Traffic (IVT) in Digital Advertising

Invalid traffic refers to clicks and impressions from a non-genuine source, including fraudulent bots or accidental clicks. But another overlooked form of IVT comes from returning users. Many will click a paid search ad, often on a brand’s own name, simply as a shortcut back to a site they already know.

At first glance this behaviour seems harmless, but it quietly drives up costs and distorts campaign performance. With competition crowding organic results and ads taking prime position, brands are left paying for clicks they shouldn’t have to, turning loyal customers into a recurring expense.

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Why Hyper-Engaged and Returning Users Are a Hidden Blind Spot

Pay-per click (PPC) campaigns have a set cap on how many clicks can be made on them before they exhaust their budget, and the ad is taken out of circulation. This is where returning users or a hyper-engaged user create an issue, as their repeated clicks to navigate to the site eat up the ads’ budget. The campaign can then no longer reach any new users, meanwhile CACs are increased.

This results in a net loss for marketers as they are still paying per click on the campaign without it actually bringing in new users or boosting conversions.

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The Cost of Misleading Clicks on CAC and PPC Budgets

The damage doesn’t stop there, as IVT also heavily influences campaign metrics. Clicks from returning users artificially inflate campaign results, distorting campaign performance data. A campaign will appear to be successful on the surface due to the high click-through rate (CTR), but in reality these clicks aren’t translating to genuine conversions.

Resources may then mistakenly be diverted to similar underperforming campaigns in the future, causing continued losses.

To remain competitive and relevant in the industry, marketers can’t afford to waste ad spend on campaigns that won’t attract real value. It’s crucial that they combat IVT and manage their returning users to prevent unnecessary losses.

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Overcoming Barriers: Why Traditional Click Fraud Tools Fall Short

While fraud from bots or malicious users is widely recognised, returning users often slip through the cracks because many solutions classify them as legitimate. Many third-party click-fraud tools do a good job blocking bots, but they rarely address highly engaged, legitimate users whose repeated clicks aren’t driving incremental results.

This creates a blind spot where campaigns continue to pay for returning prospects or existing customers.

Some advanced solutions monitor activity at the user level, giving marketers visibility into these patterns and helping protect budgets without penalising genuine engagement. By understanding who is truly adding value, brands can ensure spend is focused on acquiring new customers rather than subsidising repeated activity from the same users.

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Strategies to Manage Hyper-Engaged Users Without Hurting Loyalty

Set Custom Verification Rules to Control Excessive Clicks

Marketers can limit the number of interactions a particular user has with their campaigns by setting custom verification rules. Once a user hits the click limit, the ad will be removed from their view, and they can no longer interact with it.

This works to keep CACs from being driven up, and ad spend can be saved for potential new users. These rules can also protect campaigns from other more malicious forms of IVT like AI-powered bots, preventing them from repeatedly click spamming ads to commit click fraud.

Deploy Shadow Campaigns to Protect Budgets and User Experience

Shadow campaigns are an effective method of managing hyper-engaged users without excluding them and risking damaging their relationship with the brand.

These campaigns are an exact duplicate of an existing campaign that marketers can redirect hyper-engaged users to. The shadow campaign allows returning users to navigate to the site through paid ad searches and can be run at a much lower cost for advertisers.

This ensures that users aren’t negatively impacted, and marketing budgets are protected.

Ensuring Maximum ROI: Protecting Ad Spend from Hidden IVT

For marketers trying to maximise ROI, every ad dollar counts. To truly capitalise on the chance to reach a larger audience online, they need to ensure they aren’t throwing their ad spend away on non-profitable clicks.

Engaged users may seem like a positive at first, but they are quietly inflating costs and distorting campaign metrics. With the right tactics in place, marketers can minimise this impact while keeping loyal users on side.

To protect their campaigns and ensure their budgets don’t go to waste, it’s crucial that marketers address their IVT problem.

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Read the full article at AdNews.