There are countless varieties of lead fraud, including different types of consumer fraud, affiliate/publisher fraud, platform fraud, attorney fraud, etc.
With so many different types of fraud–and a never-ending cycle of new fraud being developed–the industry needs providers with the right culture and the right resources to continuously combat fraud. It’s never a “one-and-done” solution.
To mitigate fraud, a lead provider needs the right technology: fraud filters, machine learning, and data analytics programs. With a good IT team, this can actually be the easy part of mitigating fraud.
But even the best IT can fail without the right people behind it. That’s why it’s essential to have an army on the front lines of the fight against fraud – data analytics personnel, constantly-trained compliance specialists, and legal experts. These soldiers work closely with IT, account managers, lenders, and even regulators and Attorneys General to mitigate fraud.
LeadsMarket, for example, makes over 1,000 manual calls to leads every day to catch “stealth fraud” (where a lead passes all tech fraud filters). We have a proprietary crawler that looks at every consumer-facing website in our network to catch UDAAP violations and other problematic terms. Our team then manually examines the crawler’s results, not only for context but also to spot new trends the technology doesn’t catch. And we seed constantly, so we can see the entire lead lifecycle.
Providers also need a responsive and attentive team on the lender-relations side. We understand that you and your business want a high volume of traffic. But lead providers who turn a blind eye to lead fraud just exacerbate the situation.
LeadsMarket spends a lot of time, effort, and money on compliance. To be blunt, it’s easier for providers to compete when they play fast and loose with the rules or leave the heavy lifting to other companies. But when those types of lead providers are rewarded, lead fraud thrives. And it can be dangerous to work with those types of lead generators because lenders can be held accountable for lead generators’ activities… even four or five years after the fact!
So what’s the bottom line? You should always ask your lead provider the tough questions, and dig to get more than just superficial answers. Ask specifically about strategies to combat lead fraud. Ask about their compliance staff, their names, backgrounds, and years of experience. Ask how they are trained, and how often? What credentials does leadership bring to the table? And finally, ask about the tech. Is it proprietary? Is it flexible? And how does it stay one step ahead of the bad guys?
At LeadsMarket, our team is working around-the-clock to mitigate fraud. We understand that it’s a never-ending battle. As for you, it’s important to ask the right questions to help mitigate fraud and keep your business running smoothly.
