End Run Around Pop-up Blockers

An anonymous reader writes "The pop-up arms race continues, cnet has this article on how advertisers are responding to pop-up blockers." Can't wait for a full page of javascripted user-initiated pop-ups.

Comments

Can't Stop Tech

[abscondment]

You cannot stop technologies. What we do is we adapt to the changing technologies (and advertising environment) and continue to operate the business successfully.

That knife cuts both ways. You'll keep developing new ways to serve adds, and we'll keep blocking them.

I do think, however, that there are more people who dislike popups than who benefit from their continuing as a viable marketing option.

Advantage: Us.

Re:Can't they see it won't work?

[h4rm0ny]

I agree that it's stupid. I will actively avoid buying products where their adverts have annoyed me; but I think the logic is supposed to be as follows:

The target of the ad does not actively think "Wow - I really need that" but instead, when going to buy a product of that nature, they will go for the one that they've been exposed to the most. They don't buy the no-name deoderant, they buy the one with all the ads, etc, etc. I can tell you from experience in the food industry that often the difference between several products is just the labelling (and the price ;)

The other explanation for it is the way that the businesses work. In the larger companies, advertising departments can have a lot of influence. They also have to justify themselves. I think there is a tendancy to view the public as a mindless force susceptible to their advertising. If they see that a lot of people are browsing the web rather than watching TV or reading magazines, then panic sets in - "Oh my $DEITY, we're not getting the coverage we were before. We must get it back."

I think it's this latter panic that is really the source of such bone-headed and irritating advertising.

We need some new rules enforced in the browser

[Animats]

In addition to popup blocking, we need some better handling of popup windows in browsers:

• Windows opened from scripting are treated as children of the parent window. When the parent window closes, so must the child window. When the parent window is moved to the back or minimized, the child windows must do the same. (You can still minimize or dismiss the child window, of course.)
• Windows opened by scripting should retain some visual association with the parent window. They should overlap it at least slightly, unless the user moves the window.
• Windows opened by scripting have a user-settable maximum size. Anything bigger than this comes up with scroll bars.
• Flash animations must be closeable and blockable. Flash, and all other "controls", should run in a jail, permitted to talk to the screen and the originating site only. There must be right-click menu options to kill any "control", whether it likes it or not.
• All windows have close buttons.
• No script can open more than one window per user click.

We need to keep control of the browser GUI in the user's hands, no matter what the site tries to do.

Ad Performance...

[zokrath]

From the article:

Click rates, or the number of times people click on an ad, could explain the growth of pop-up ads. Marketers say between 2 percent and 5 percent of the people who receive them will respond with a click. That compares with less than 0.35 percent for the most widely used ad on the Net today, static banners, according to an ad server report from DoubleClick.

"Pop-unders still yield the best performance,"

This probably has something to do with the fact that a large percentage of pop ups use deceptive techniques to get someone to click on them unwittingly.

From 'System Needs to Update, click anywhere in this window to Update your system', to 'Your system is not secure, click anywhere in this window to secure your system', to "Error Xb3t10-2, click anywhere in this window to continue", to ads that simulate windows and have their own 'close' buttons that are just part of the ad graphics, (Even I have accidentally clicked on those a few times,) there are myriad different 'strategies' that advertiseers use to trick people into thinking that the pop up is not an ad, but an essential message from their computer machine that they should obey.

Meanwhile, people have learned that 'click to win' banner ads generally aren't worth their time, and so they have stopped clicking on them as often as they used to.

With the current batch of viruses growing larger and more dangerous, there will be more people that know they should be worried abotu viruses, ,but don't know what they should do about it. ANy official sounding windows that pop up will likely garner a click, even if they suspect it is an ad, 'just in case'. It doesn't cost them anything, that they can see.

As to floaters and various flash ads, browser makers and macromedia need to take some responsibility and provide options to prevent that kind of crap. Going to a website and then having a floating ad with motion and sound that I cannot close, or an ad that floats over what I am trying to read, is quite irritating, and I will never purchase.

For some companies that I normally buy from, I have sent letters explaining that their intrusive ads have caused me to lower my expenditures on their products. Generally I get back a canned response that places the blame on the advertising firm that made the ad. Apparently advertising firms are privateers now, that companies give payment and blessing to, and then take no respoinsibility for.