was just surfing around (not here), when I saw apparently in one thread that some folks were discussing very heavily about using ad blockers to block ads... My question is, do you worry about the day when your users will start to employ these blockers? or is there something that you're actually actively doing now, that actually helps?
At the moment the type of people who actively try to block ads are very unlikely to click on them anyway. I would imagine it would only become a problem if something big decided to implement them like Internet Explorer or Firefox otherwise 90% of users wouldn't know about it anyway.
yeah, that's what I was thinking, but still... You'll never know. I wouldnt mind clicking on an ad if (a) I thought that the site brought some value to me, and (b) I was genuinely curious, or interested in the ad, but you know what? If I develop a habit of applying an ad blocker consistently, I would never even be able to get my curiosity aroused in the first place... That's what I'm worried about. well there's an adblocker extension for firefox. It's an extension, though - and not part of the core firefox download.
I suppose you got that right. I will choose to just at least be aware, and be prepared if it should hit me... Or do I worry too much? Oh no.... That's ... worrying....
This is a moot point as you have no control over how visitors to you site have thier computers setup.
"This is a moot point as you have no control over how visitors to you site have thier computers setup." Actually, you do. Visit Free Ringtone Heaven (link in sig) without Javascript turned on and try to download a ringtone. It won't let you. When I first started doing the server side (not client side) javascript check I saw that a low 40% of people had javascript enabled. It didn't take long for that number to climb. Current stats for FRH 54858 ips counted 35162 ips with javascript enabled. 64.096394327172% Making sure Javascript is enabled is the first step to ensuring visitors are seeing your ads. It's very easy to break browsers that don't have JS enabled for directory based sites a href = "nojavascript.php" onClick="this.href=''the real link" You of course only do this with links to external pages, not links within the site.
Well...You can guarantee that you wont be getting return visitors if you break the links for the sake of making sure they have javascript enabled. As long as Windows Vista and all other MS operating systems come prebundled with IE (And they wont have adblock installed because well...Microsoft is going into that venture as well), there will always be visitors that don't have the means, the knowledge, or the caring to try and make the ads go away. As someone above said, The ones that do install adblocker are the ones that will be able to spot the ads from a mile away, and won't be inclined to click on them. There is still a large majority of people that don't even know where to SEARCH to FIND that firefox extension, no worries from me .
If adblockers get too popular then we'll see some type of harder to block server side options become available. The market is too big now to let it get swallowed up by adblocking software... unless of course Microsoft can invent something that blocks all ads except their own ads...
My principle is if they use ad blockers, they're not interested on buying anything off the net. So even if those people weren't using ad blockers, and they happen to click on the ad, they won't buy anything. Yes we can make a few cents but google don't like that. We want google to be happy don't we?
"You can guarantee that you wont be getting return visitors if you break the links for the sake of making sure they have javascript enabled." If that were true the percentage wouldn't be going up. If you provide something people want they will enable javascript to use it. If you're providing a free service and visitors refuse to support your work by simply allowing ads to load then those aren't the visitors you want anyway. It's not free to the owner to provide the services. It's very small minority that selfishly bitches about ads. And I stopped caring about them years ago after I tried charging visitors directly for access. Not so surprisingly they don't want to pay for web-sites themselves. Why should I go bankrupt just so you can have "free" stuff? Complaining about obnoxious ads is one thing but blocking all ads is quite another. There's nothing unreasonable about AdSense type ads. The other thing I found was that by forcing javascript to be enabled the amount of ad revenue went up. The click thru rate went up. That means that the people who say they wouldn't click on the ads anyway are full of it. "If adblockers get too popular then we'll see some type of harder to block server side options become available." The trick is to figure out how to make the adblocker break your site while not screwing up the search engines. This is why even with js disabled you can still browse my sites. It doesn't hurt me in the least. This server side check has done nothing but postively affect ad revenue. I highly recommend it.
For the past couple of years (up until last week) I ran ad-blocking countermeasures that blocked anybody who blocked my ads. My measures were robust enough to stop AdBlock, Greasemonkey and even Proxomitron cold in their tracks. A couple years ago this was becoming a necessity as ad revenues were lean, web hosting was expensive and I was always exceeding my bandwidth allocations. Now; however, ad revenues are going through the roof, web hosting has gotten a lot more reasonable and bandwidth allocations have been increased to levels I'd have a very hard time exeeding. As such I really don't see the need to continue blocking those who block my ads. Also Adblocking isn't as big of a deal as it was a couple years ago. The big key is for web publishers to be a little more restrained in the types of ads they use so that the ads aren't overly obnoxious. I found that typically between 3-10% of users block ads. Lately my CTR and eCPM has been significantly increasing so I'm not as worried about ad-blocking. If things ever change, I can turn on my ad-blocking countermeasures by changing one variable in my PHP code.
"My principle is if they use ad blockers, they're not interested on buying anything off the net" They just think they aren't. These people, if they see an ad, are just as likely to buy (if not more likely) than people without ad blockers. Advertising works if it's seen. That's why with the js check ad revenue went up significantly. I'd wager that those without adblockers are more blind to ads because they "see" them all the time. Those with adblockers will be more likely to see an ad if you force it on them because they're not used to them. It's like people who avoid bacteria their whole life. If something ever gets by, they're going to be hurting a lot more than someone who's been exposed to bacteria their whole life.
I know that if they block ads then every site they go to, most of them will look tacky. Mine would anyway. With some sites it will just leave blanks everywhere.