The Armageddon Begins for Online Banners
For those of us in web development, the birth of another browser is trouble amplified 100 times as we now have to add another browser to the QA list, but for users however, anything newly enhanced and improved as far as browsers go is as sweet as honey on the lips.
Never mind how grateful I am of the speed of Firefox 3.0, today I want to talk about this handy add-on tool Adblock Plus which enables users to block banner ads directly on websites and what that means to the online ad industry.
The first thing you have to realize is that we are not talking about pop-up blockers anymore. We’re blatantly talking about “Ad” blockers, that’s right, particularly AdBlock Plus which was developed by Wladimir Palant. This add-on literally shuts off all banner ads with the click of a button to all the websites that display ads. Major media owners like Yahoo are not exempt from it either. No ad space can escape the eradicative powers of the AdBlock Plus.
There is no harsher reality to the traditional online advertising industry than this. Adblock Plus has logged 21,434,766 downloads (as of today). That’s 21 million 4 hundred thousand and bla bla bla… people and their machines, and that is only for the Firefox browser; I think you get the idea.
I downloaded and tried it and it stripped and got rid of all the ads on all the websites I frequent, no joke.
Here’s an example of what RedHerring.com looks like normally.
This is what RedHerring.com looks like after I enabled AdBlock Plus on Firefox 3.0.
Here’s another example of what CNET.com looks like normally.
And here is what CNET.com looks like when AdBlock Plus is turned on.
Notice there are no ads!
With 21.4 million downloads to AdBlock Plus, this renders all banner ads useless because it won’t even show up with the tool turned on. This feature is not media-owner controlled, it is user-controlled so there goes your audience. They choose not to be your audience!
I question how and why internet advertisers believe their ad banners are communicating the right messages across. Common sense stuff… people are hating banner ads to the core because they are distracting, intrusive, and annoying. The only banners they don’t mind clicking on are (frankly) from sources that they trust and the deal has to be really, really good. For example, if HSBC advertised an offer of a “no-questions asked” 10% interest paid on a month-to-month basis on your Savings account if you switch from your current bank to HSBC, yes, you’re going to get millions of people clicking on it. Still, with AdBlock Plus, even ads I don’t mind clicking won’t be showing up anymore.
People channel surf on TV during advert slots. With the web, they’ll turn you off completely because they can. The only way users cannot turn you off is if you infiltrate and build your brand and products into the very marrow and breath of the content they bask themselves in.
Although this post is not about my proposed strategies (you can hire me for that :)) a good example would be to have a brand like Pizza Hut build an online ordering facility for home delivery into a virtual world for online RPG games like the SIMS, instead of offering coupons online via ad space.
There are no absolute answers and ad space will still generate revenue for media owners, but with things like the AdBlock Plus being allowed to exist, online banner days will soon come to an end.
Who?
JACQUELINE MIAO
Web Strategist
PRINCE2 Project Manager
Location: London, U.K.-
