• Silicon Alley Insider , Thursday, March 27, 2008 2 PM

Henry Blodget has the inside scoop on comScore's paid click report for February, which "appears to be a slight--slight--improvement from the horrific January report" for Google, which showed flat click growth year-over-year. Paid click growth on Google was actually up 3% in February, but that's not enough, according to Blodget, as "our source believes Wall Street was looking for 5%-7% growth in Google's US paid clicks and that this report will likely cause the stock to trade down."

The post sparked a major discussion in the comments stream, with some readers questioning why investors are clinging to comScore's data as the primary barometer of Google's performance. "It's like comScore has become the Federal Reserve board of Internet companies," wrote one. "I wouldn't base investments on comScore approximations," said another.

Discussion also swirled around the futility of thinking that the giant can continue to show explosive paid click growth in a maturing market. "We spend 15,000 to 20,000 per month with Google, and have learned in 3 years when to spend, what key words to use, and what not to," said one reader. "As the world learns how AdWords works, Google's numbers are not going to grow like in the early 2002-2005 time, when everyone was trying it and not understanding it."

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