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IAB Recommends Larger Web Advertising

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the cure-for-what-ails-you dept.

Chicane-UK writes "Popups, flash adverts, full screen adverts and all the other methods of internet advertising that make our daily drag through the internet have been deemed not effective enough. The solution, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau is the new Universal Ad Package which comprises a new 'large advert' and three other in page advert templates. Read their press release here. I know I for one am sick of internet advertising of this type - banners were just about right for me." For some reason advertisers never come up with new, smaller advertising formats. There's also a story on AdAge.

15 of 394 comments (clear)

  1. Huh? by Kickasso · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Sure they did come up with smaller ad formats. Ever heard about google?

  2. Advertising doesn't work by 91degrees · · Score: 5, Interesting

    There was a large box below the story.

    A question for those of you who have not blocked advertising - Without looking - what was it for?

    People learn to ignore these thing pretty quickly. Making them bigger isn't going to help. They need to find new ways to advertise. How do they do this? Here's an idea - Give some reason for the customers to click. Offer prizes. Pay for a promotional story. I'm sure people would have no objection to Slashdot having clearly labelled advertising articles written by the advertisers.

  3. Hipocrits.... by MxTxL · · Score: 5, Interesting

    You notice that the IAB site doesn't have so much as one ad on it.... not a single 'punch the monkey', not one 'natural viagra' and not even a faux windows error.

    If they expect everyone to use their super obtrusive template, you would think that they would at lease bother to ugly up their own pages with that crap. How do they expect people to take them seriously?

  4. Radio by mccalli · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Has anyone done a study to compare the various advertising models and their effectiveness?

    In the UK they have, and believe the most cost-effective was said to be radio advertising.

    Think about it - you're driving along or doing some other task, and the radio's on in the background. You're unlikely to switch station just because an advert came on, since the radio is not your primary focus at that moment. On the TV or the net however, you're concentrating on the screen and so you're more likely to be annoyed by distractions to that focus.

    Cheers,
    Ian

  5. Too much by dachshund · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Full page advertising and those Flash ads that inject themselves on top of what you're reading are about a hundred times more intrusive than anything even an ad-loaded glossy magazine is ever going to give you. One thing dead-tree publications never demand is that you stop what you're doing and watch some silly, slow Flash animation.

    Advertisers should stick with injecting the ads into the article text, even if they're large blocks that you have to scroll through until you get to the rest of it. Being forced through full page ads or Flash crap just makes me want to avoid a site.

  6. Re:Larger? by e8johan · · Score: 4, Interesting

    "As far as I am concerned, Internet adverts are just like magazine adverts. I don't notice those ones either (unlike TV adverts)."

    You notice the lost time, especially when you're connected through a slow modem and pay by the minute... It is a huge bandwidth wasteage!

    I'd actually pay more for a guarantee against banners and spam from my ISP.

  7. Interesting viewpoint. by Fex303 · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I think that format of the ad is not the problem. It's the content. Displaying a huge ad on a website that gets readers who don't care about the product won't get clicked on.

    Furthermore, if you annoy your reader/viewer then they won't be inclined to find out more about the product you've got to sell. That's why animated ad, popups, flash ads, etc never, ever get clicked on. At least, not by me.

    Gabe from Penny Arcade said in a recent rant/news bulliten something that sums it up nicely:

    Here is another little behind the scenes look at the way advertising works on the internet. Game companies want animation. They want a fucking guy to parachute down from the top of your screen and land on the article you're trying to read. They want you to have to interact with their advertisement just so you can see the content you came for. Everyone who uses the internet knows that this kind of shit is just frustrating. Look at sites like IGN, Gamespot, or Gamespy. You can't read an article there without an animated bug crawling across your screen or some flash ad blaring shitty music. When we decided to do advertising we decided that we wouldn't ever run any kind of animated add. Some companies won't advertise with us because of it. Others, it's like pulling teeth to get a non animated ad out of them. They have this idea in their head that the only way their ads will be effective is if they are annoying as fuck.

    Some of them are actually shocked when ads at PA out perform animated versions at other sites like IGN. Here we are just a little comic site and we kick their fucking ass. We tell them that if you don't insult people with shitty flash ads, they are much more likely to actually check out your game. I have never once clicked on a flash ad except to mute it or close it and I have a feeling you guys are pretty much the same. They just can't get it through their heads that people don't like to be annoyed by advertising.

    Penny Arcade, those guys really are the source of all wisdom...

  8. Re:Marketing = Low Thinking by overunderunderdone · · Score: 3, Interesting

    But I will smolder in Hell before I ever buy one because of their obnoxious advertising.. So who -is- buying them?

    Thousands of horny teenagers. So if you are unethical and want to sell this product who do you want to sell it to, a few dozen geeks with a practical use or a signicantly larger percentage of the population - horny males (including the geeks).

    Besides the "dumb" marketing guys probably have a second brand-name for the product that is focused on the non-voyeur, legitimate side of the market. A brand marketted to legitimate security applications or geeks tinkering with the thing. There is no reason why they cannot have their cake, and eat it to.

  9. Better forms of advertising (proper format) by henben · · Score: 5, Interesting
    The advertising sales dept at a previous job told me about one of their most lucrative and effective (for the advertisers) forms of advertising.

    Apparently, sponsorship of our newsletter - effectively a one or two line text ad in an opt-in news email - was very effective.

    Also, the site made a fair bit of money through selling relevant books, job listings, etc.

    This was over a year ago now - how long will it take marketers to get a clue? Don't they understand that the way to get results is to make advertising relevant and useful, rather than increasingly intrusive? I like the ads on Google because sometimes they actually help me with what I'm trying to do.

    Also, didn't we just hear that Amazon's affiliate program is one of its most cost-effective marketing tools?

    All the IAB proposal will do is increase the usage of ad-filtering software. I filter (most) ads and have no compunction about doing so, because I already know that I don't want to punch the fucking monkey.

    I understand that branding ads are a different animal from direct sales pitches. If they're done entertainingly (e.g. the Absolut ads on the Onion), then I don't have a problem with them.

    The people complaining about "leeching" pop-up blockers, and demanding bigger formats, are the ones advertising on the principle of throwing garish shit at millions of eyeballs in the hope that some of it sticks. These are the companies selling overhyped security products, online gambling, cyberstalking software etc. Sites accepting this kind of stuff are only harming themselves in the long term. If you think your site's survival depends on this sort of thing, you're doomed - explore other possibilities!

  10. Profiling can be good by Mr+Guy · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This is when I wouldn't mind certain trusted stores being a little more intensive with what they do with my information they already have.

    Example, Amazon.com has a reputation to protect, so I, perhaps ignorantly, trust them with LOTS of my information, including my credit card numbers and other data about myself. Foolish as it may be, I trust them because I believe I personally wouldn't mind at all if they went ahead and asked me when I bought something what it was for, letting me optionally tell them I was buying it for my wife for Christmas, or for my sister for her birthday.

    In addition to the profile they build about me then, they could build useful profiles about who I interact with. I honestly wouldn't mind at ALL if they gave me some option of connecting Me Myname who lives at 123 Thisstreet USA with Mywife Myname at 123 Thisstreet USA, perhaps asking me first if, yes, they are the person I'm related to or friends with. Then, instead of randomly spamming book suggestions at me, they could say,

    Special Day Alert You know, your wife's birthday is coming up, if you buy now we can ship it there in plenty of time, and by the way, you bought her alot of science fiction books before, but she buys mostly classic novels for herself, so we'd suggest getting something a little more romantic this time. Maybe these titles are more her taste:

    I sure wouldn't mind a notice that such and such has already bought the book I'm about to ship to their address, maybe I'd like to pick another.

    Of course, to give them that level of control I'd want an easy to navigate privacy agreement that specifies what happens if the company gets bought or folds. You'd also have to opt in on BOTH sides. (You can't tell the husband the wife has been browsing 'Divorce Made Easy' with her consent of course).

    If your ads are part of your service, your customers will begin to love them.

    --
    Never confuse volume with power.
  11. One big reason why ads are not effective for me... by weave · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I have delayed reactions and I browse quickly. There have been an insignificant number of times where an ad strikes my fancy and that fact registers as I am clicking to go to a new page. I want to click on the ad, so I page back, and it's some other ad. The ad I want is gone and no way to find it again.

    Every site that serves ads should have a single page with a list of all ads so someone who wants to go back and see an ad, even maybe a day or two later, can quickly find it and click through.

    Real life recent example: I saw an ad on slashdot for some network camera that I later wanted to find out more info about. I haven't seen that damn ad since and I'm not going to keep hitting reload until it may pop up again.

    Marketing people need a big 2x4 clue-stick fed-ex'ed to their forehead at times...

  12. Tell them about it... by JoseMonkey · · Score: 2, Interesting

    While I'm certain they didn't have a /. audience in mind when they posted it, I couldn't help but notice the headline that asks "WHAT'S YOUR OPINION ON THE UNIVERSAL AD PACKAGE?" with a link to a survey where you can tell 'em what you really think.

  13. Advertising not always required to sell a product by Wonderkid · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I come from England, and until recently, advertising outside of magazines was considered offensive. On the BBC's Tomorrow's World TV show, product names and logos were covered up. Consumer purchased products because they saw them in use elsewhere. I bought my first Audi Coupé GT because a friend visited in one, and I was impressed. All advertising does is re-inforce a brand. If we purchased products because we saw them advertised, we would be idiots because we would be parting with our money without knowing if what we we purchasing was a viable product. Word of mouth sells. Of course, advertising is essential to introduce a new product too, but an opt in (permission marketing) based service is a way to clean up the web. And yup, I'm about to advertise. We're about to do it at GoNumber.net by allowing those with a Personal listing to choose to receive news from the manufacturers of products. For example, if you own a particular car, you will be able to opt to be notified of recalls, new gadgets, models etc. Simply click a checkbox to stop the flow. The potential is significant and finally offers an alternative to an advertising overload.

    --

    O'WONDERWe're working on it.

  14. Re:Larger? by beebware · · Score: 2, Interesting

    It wouldn't work. Basically, imagine the '28.8k modem' setting sends just text ads., but the "Broadband connection" settings send great big Flash ads. I know that I, amongst others, would "fake" my connection settings so it appears I'm coming from a 28.8k modem: just because I've got a "fat pipe" doesn't mean I want it all being used downloading adverts that I wouldn't pay attention to anyway (I've got better things to do with my bandwidth thank you very much). Saying that, I have clicked on more "text ad" style adverts than banners (0 popups clicked) so...

  15. Re:Larger? (Dumb) by anonicon · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Hey. For what it's worth, I don't carry ads or any other "gimme, gimme, gimme!" devices on my site since I figure it will just piss off site visitors and hurt me in the long run. Besides, 1000s of sites have advertising, would it be so bad if one didn't?

    I do make some nice money from providing banned books info with affiliate-paid linked Amazon reviews, and from pointing out really good independent artists at CDBaby that I also make an affiliate free from if you purchase something. That said, if you want your web site to make money from something besides affiliate fees and ad fees, you need to provide enough value to your clients or the public to be worth charging for. Otherwise forget it, IMO.

    Chuck