Q: How do affiliates secretly steal credit through brand bidding?

Q: How do affiliates secretly steal credit through brand bidding?

Brand bidding is when a partner buys ads on your own brand name, then collects commission on customers who were already coming to you. You pay an affiliate fee for a sale you'd have gotten free — pure margin loss disguised as performance.

How to catch and stop it:

— Put an explicit "no bidding on brand terms or close variants" clause in your terms, with examples.

— Monitor your branded search results from a clean browser/incognito weekly, and from a couple of geos.

— Use a paid-search monitoring tool (BrandVerity-type) once you're spending real money.

— Define the penalty up front: first offense = commission reversal, second = removal. Vague threats get ignored.

Caveat: distinguish trademark bidding from legitimate trademark-plus-modifier content ("BrandX review"). Banning the second kills honest reviewers. Be precise about what's actually prohibited.

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