NONE: Re: ONLINE-ADS>> obligatory ad viewing--good idea or bad?
Re: ONLINE-ADS>> obligatory ad viewing--good idea or bad?
Kenneth C. Jenks (mindseye_at_tale.com)
Fri, 14 Feb 1997 00:31:27 -0600
>At 10:25 AM -0600 2/12/97, Elizabeth Gardner made this statement of rare
>insight:
>> Someone recently told me about a CD-ROM based magazine that forces readers
>> to view at least five seconds of an ad after they've finished each article,
>> before they're allowed to click back to the table of contents to access the
>> next article. They're thinking of using this strategy on the Web, and they
>> say they've gotten some big content providers interested in trying it.
Donna Dolezal Zelzer <djz_at_efn.org> replied:
>I personally think it's a miserable idea. As a consumer, I highly resent
>being forced to look at someone's ad, even for 5 seconds. I also resent it
>when someone tries to take control of *my* computer and *my* browser and
>not allow me to do what I want. I would be highly inclined *not* to buy
>from that company, for those reasons alone.
We've had very good success at this concept, with remarkably little
resentment from consumers. But we offer this kind of intrusive advertisement
as an ALTERNAIVE payment mechanism, where the user chooses to pay attention
to ads rather than paying real money for content.
Donna:
>As an advertiser, I wouldn't consider possibly alienating people by
>throwing my product/service in their face like that.
It seems to make all the difference in the world when it's voluntary and the
customer knows ahead of time that he's going to be subjected to an intrusive
ad in order to pay for the content.
>Why not integrate the ads into the content in such a way that, while
>obviously ads, they relate to the content and would be of interest to
>people interested in the content?
In some cases, the content has nothing to do with the product being
advertised. In other cases (like some of our more gruesome horror stories),
the advertiser doesn't want to be that intimately associated with the
content. For example, Donna, your business could sponsor stories at Mind's
Eye Fiction, targeting married women in their childbearing years or men with
children under 18. But you probably wouldn't customize your content to make
it "relate to" one of our vampire stories. Consumers are accustomed to a
dichotomy between advertising and editorial content -- how many TV shows are
really related to "feminine protection"?
Integration of advertising with editorial content can work very well, like a
robotics company sponsoring a science fiction story about robotics or a
cutlery shop sponsoring a fantasy story involving swordplay, but creating
the customized ads often cost the sponsor more than the price of the media
buy, and the return on investment isn't usually there. A sponsor is usually
better off re-using an existing ad rather than creating an ad specifically
tied to editorial content.
>Why not design ads that draw people in, rather than forcing people to look
>at them for a period of time?
Because it just plain doesn't work as well. Can you name the product
advertised in the last five banner ads you saw? I can't. Only 15% of our
focus group could remember even one banner ad five minutes after exposure.
Can you name the product advertised after you were "forced" to type the name
of the product to view the content you want? 85% of our focus group members
could.
Interaction works. Banners don't.
But the key word is "force." If you annoy the customer, he leaves. But if
you tell the customer what to expect, then give the customer the content he
wants for "free" he stays and reads more content -- and more ads.
Want proof? See the on-line stats for our targeted interactive advertising.
http://tale.com/profile/
-- Ken Jenks, Editor-in-chief, Mind's Eye Fiction
http://tale.com/ -- The First Web Publisher
MindsEye_at_tale.com
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