Remember Creative

Little over a week ago Google implemented a change that blocks certain types of ads on their browser Chrome.

Google Chrome had this to say in their announcement: “To determine which ads not to show, we’re relying on the Better Ads Standards from the Coalition for Better Ads, an industry group dedicated to improving the experience of the ads we see on the web.”

They aren’t trying to stop ads entirely, why would they? That is where they make their money … almost $100 billion last year alone from online advertising. A cynic would assume that they are aiming at blocking others ads, but not one resulting from AdWords – the cynic would be wrong. Google openly admits that this update will even affect some ads that are on their network.

Ads that Betterads.org suggest lead to a poor user experience are broken into two categories, desktop and mobile:

betterads.org

Like most of us, I am a voracious consumer of content on the web and this update makes me happy for obvious reasons, but my allegiances are torn as a digital marketer and as an egalitarian.

Firstly, although Google are making the change, it’s at the behest of a consortium that has our best interests and UX at its heart, but should they choose what ads I see on a website that is owned by someone else? Shouldn’t the site’s owner get the call – if they see bounce rates skyrocket because users hate the UX of a site, then they can choose to change.

If said website owner has the best content, then why not have a prestitial ad with countdown. I’m on Forbes.com often and it doesn’t bother me one bit if I am going to take ten minutes to read an article and have to wait the first five seconds watching an ad. On the other hand, if I am wanting to watch a 30 second YouTube clip (owned by Google) why would I want to watch a five second pre-roll before I can skip?

And the other part of me thinks, rather than focusing on better ad experiences, why not focus on better ads. Geico’s pre-roll ad from a couple of years back was a gem.

The creativity is brilliant and made users wait until the end, even though the ad was practically finished in 5 seconds.

So the consumer and marketer in me is happy for less annoying ad experiences, but craves more creativity. It takes time to craft and create ads that appeal to the shortest of attention spans … see below.

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