Advertising nightmare: why even getting through a single article can be a pain.

There is so much to read and so many things to learn on the internet now, but what is the biggest thing that is preventing us from reading on? Advertisements. Plain and simple. From a marketing student’s perspective I should appreciate these things, right? Wrong. Nothing has turned me away faster from reading something on a website, blog, or social media platform more than ads.

I have written about suggested posts and ads before on my blog and how I became a fan of these at times, but this form of advertising is different. I want to focus on the problems with the ads, this includes videos, pictures, pop up links, and so on, that seem to bombard you when all you want that time is to read something.

 

A very recent example can be seen in the photos above. I was trying to find an article to comment on for class and immediately lost interest due to the several advertisements that were inserted right at the beginning.

At first this post may seem a bit like I am complaining, which I am, but my overall thought  and question I wanted to bring up is how will this bombardment of ads effect a website’s reach? Will this turn a lot of people away? Has it already turned a lot of consumers away?

I am aware that these problems don’t exist often on an actual company’s site, but when it comes to certain media platforms this advertising increase has been noticeable and quite frankly annoying.

Also, another topic comes to mind when I look at these imbedded advertisements, which is ‘content marketing’. As I have learned in class, this is something that has been around for a long time, but is recently finding it’s way back into several companies marketing strategies. How will these constant interruptions effect getting information to the consumers?

As time goes on I do see these types of advertising tactics being implemented in a better way, or at least I hope so. As a consumer I do not enjoy trying to read something online and having these types of things pushed at me. And as a marketing student I do not see this as a very smart tactic for companies to take. This goes back to the basics of push versus pull advertising. A company must assess how much these advertisements, pop ups, etc. are truly benefitting them. Could advertising and media budgets be spent in a different way?

What are your thoughts on these imbedded advertisements on websites, blogs, etc.? Comment your thoughts below!