Re: measuring the effectiveness of newsletters
ALEC ELLIS <alece_at_glopro.com> WROTE:
> research was done (again!) that showed people looked
> more often than not at an AD placed in the bottom right
> hand corner of a web page.... (I believe it was
> referring to the bottom right hand corner ON SCREEN at
> the time...not after scrolling!!)
I think they mean "following the body text" - scrolling
is not a bad thing - for reasons I'll explain in a
moment. I also think, like advertising on the web in
general, this phenomenon is almost entirely dependent
on *context*. Here's why - and when - I think it
works:
Granted, fewer eyeballs make it all the way down to the
bottom of any page. But those that do are *genuinely*
interested in whatever the article is about. They've
proven that. When one finishes reading an article, the
banner can act as a visual "footer", a psychological
cue that says "this is definitely the end of the page."
But further (and more importantly): this is a
reflective moment for an absorbed reader; the moment
he/she "comes back to earth" or sits there thinking
about the topic. This is a very good place for a
well-contexted ad because (thinking like a magazine
editor) - the ad can be exploited *as copy* - to
provide an emotional "followup", "sidebar", or even a
"counterpoint" to the main text.
Here's a no-brainer example... An article on hackers,
followed by a "scare" ad for a software firewall
product.
Yes, the age-old war between editorial and advertising
rears its blurry head once again...
Tod Foley
http://www.whatyouget.com
http://www.asifproductions.com
Received on Tue Aug 15 2000 - 04:29:52 CDT
