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Do Good CAPTCHAs Really Have To Be Unfriendly? An Expert Explains

For those of you who are not familiar with the term, a CAPTCHA is a feature on many user populated websites, such as Myspace with the purpose of blocking automated programs from spamming its users and for overall security. Here is how it works:

A user is required to enter a random letter and number password into a form before being able to submit information, log in, etc. This password is essentially given directly to the user in an image, rather than in text form, so that an automated program cannot detect the characters. The password the form field expects is the same as that shown on the image, but this sometimes causes problems.

Jeff Atwood at the Coding Horrors blog discusses whether CAPTCHAs are dead. This follows a news report that scalpers probably beat the CAPTCHAs at Ticketmaster.

Jeff links to a Chinese site that sells CAPTCHA decoders. The site quotes different prices for breaking different CAPTCHAs. An eBay decoder, for example, is being sold for $4000 and claims 70% accuracy.

What caught my attention were the unbreakable CAPTCHAs in the list. The Yahoo CAPTCHA is listed as unbreakable. That isn't surprising. Most of us can barely get it right ourselves.

Consider a Yahoo CAPTCHA. Sometimes you cannot tell the difference between a G or a 6? And the way that letters are often skewed, the difference bewteen certain uppercase and lowercase letters is virtually unrecognizable?

Contrast that with a Google CAPTCHA also listed as unbreakable. The Google image is clean and legible. Most of us have no difficulty getting it right. Google demonstrates that effective CAPTCHAs don't have to be unfriendly to users.

I am curious to learn which CAPTCHA libraries generate strong, yet user friendly challenges.

The Importance of Market Research

Marketing is a versatile, competitive world, and when developing your marketing plan, odds are you will not get it right the first time. You need time to learn about the demographics, geography, and psycho graphics of your customers before your marketing can really be effective. That is why it is important to not stick with your first plan, as you will need to change it frequently for one reason or another.

A good phrase to live by in marketing is, "Learn from your mistakes." Sometimes testing happens naturally. Some of your marketing campaigns will fail, but instead of getting discouraged, analyze what went wrong. Maybe you advertised through the wrong medium, or to the wrong demographic. Collect all the mistakes you have made and really look at them; do not try to forget or ignore them, you have to face your mistakes if you want to be successful.

If you hate making mistakes and want to get it right the first time, there is a way, and that is market research. However, full on market research is incredibly expensive and small businesses cannot afford it, but light end market research is possible. Basically, you just have to look at the demographic of your competitors and make that your demographic. It's not that easy, though. Demographics may vary between businesses of the same nature, and that is where testing comes in. You need to test if that demographic works for you, and if it does not, you need to test another demographic.

You should not spend a lot of money on market tests. The purpose, after all, is to find the medium and demographic through which you should advertise or market. For example, if you have a website, you might want to try out banner advertising. Don't spend a lot of money at first, only spend a little and see the ROI. If the conversion is good, you know you will want to keep advertising through that medium. Executing so many marketing tests is time-consuming and costly, but it all pays off when you finally develop an effective, recyclable marketing campaign.

Pay Per Clicks

There are many advertising options out there for small and large businesses alike. A new phenomenon that has recently hit the scene is the use of sponsored link searches for advertising needs. Are sponsored links really the best way to allocate valuable advertising dollars?

A re occurring complaint I hear from many of my customers is that sponsored links are not developing the return on investment they desire. There are several key reasons to why this may be occurring. Sponsored links, or pay per click advertising, are links on the right hand side of most search engines. These links, historically, are only used by approximately 30% of the online search market. By using only sponsored links in your online marketing campaign, you have essentially cut out 70% of the market that may be searching for your business. Further, did you know that there is a constant bidding war on the sponsored side of the page? Business are having to spend valuable working time managing their sponsored link page to make sure the are staying on the first page, while not breaking the bank. Because most consumers don't search past the first page of search engines, it is a constant war to "out bid" your competitors and stay in those valuable spots. But what is to keep your competitors from clicking your links and costing you tons of money and headaches? Thankfully, Google (among others) have allowed you to set certain limits on the amount of money you wish to spend monthly on sponsored link searches. While pay per click ads may get you some form of business, I do not believe they are the end all in online marketing. It is important to recognize several key factors when thinking about investing in pay per clicks.

1) How can I minimize "fraudulent" clicks by my competitors

2) Are their other online options, for around the same cost, which can give me a better return on investment? and

3) Am I willing to cut our 70% of the search market by spending money on sponsored links?

For some businesses, pay per clicks work. I am not advocating that they don't. The law of "big numbers" may come into play here where if you do something long enough, the average return will be worth the investment. I have found other advertising mediums that allow my customers a better, more stable, return on their investment. Diversity is the key to the marketing game and in order to advertise to all corners of a market, it is necessary to weigh your options and decide if you have the time, and money, to play the "big numbers" game.

Chad Sandifer
http://www.tenlist.com