The use of ad blocking is surging and is costing companies billions of pounds, according to a new report.
Use of software to keep ads off web pages has increased 41 per cent, according to a report by Adobe and PageFair, costing $22 billion in lost revenue in 2015. And the numbers are set to keep increasing.
I use ad blocking software and will continue to do so. I do not want to be bombarded with advertisements for crap I don’t want and will never buy. If I want something, I will seek it out. I certainly don’t want it shoved in my face when I am reading about something else. And I don’t want targeted ads either. So, if this is costing businesses money – learn from it. Seek another means of revenue. But don’t get all pissy because people don’t want intrusive advertisements shoved in their faces. I don’t watch television ads either. My usual trick is to time-shift – I record the programme and skip the ads when we watch. They are, for the most part, irrelevant to what I might want and an insult to my intelligence. Again, don’t like it? then change your business model.
These ‘lost revenue’ calculations are nonsense – until the offspring showed me how to use adblock, I simply ignored the ads and never clicked on one, and I’m sure I’m not alone.
Adblock users are surely a self-selecting group of those much less likely than the general population to succumb to the blandishments of online marketing.
I’m pretty sure that the lost revenue refers to money not paid to the websites because the ads were not displayed.
“I simply ignored the ads and never clicked on one”
There’s more to it than simply “Ignoring” – even if you are able to do so (I’m not…). Intrusive adverts mean more data has to be downloaded and processed by your browser. This can be a significant matter if you’re on a limited download plan (particularly when using mobile data). Furthermore, adverts are a common attack vector, and blocking them is a simple, and effective way to reduce that risk.
“I don’t watch television ads either. My usual trick is to time-shift – I record the programme and skip the ads when we watch”
Unfortunately even this won’t stop my blood pressure rising when trying to watch anything on 5USA – the unbelievably crass promo for Kia cars, featuring a boring couple in one of said manufacturers products makes me utterly determined NEVER
Summat went wrong when posting – it should read: “makes me utterly determined NEVER to buy one!”
Indeed. If advertising ever works on me, it is to do this.
Data download/security risk or not, I admit I occasionally miss the unintentional humour of targeted ads – after I wrote a satirical piece on a cemetery, for example, there were ads inviting me to “memorialize a Loved One’s ashes in a tasteful paperweight”.
The trouble with avoiding products with irritating TV adverts is that the list is growing longer by the minute. My mother (who perhaps deserves some kind of award for consistency – or bloody-mindedness) has a head start on me; she has never set foot in a Morrisons since hearing the 1990s ‘Mexican Hat’ jingle – “More REA-sons to SHOP at Mor-RIS-ons” – on the basis that, if they can’t scan a lyric, they shouldn’t be trusted with food.
She has a point.
Problem is that I already avoid any products that sponsor main league football, have naff annoying adverts, or try and scam me with hidden price rises (latest being the RAC who want more money to renew than they advertise for new members). It’s getting difficult to find people I am happy to deal with.
Quite so. However, at least we have the choice to refuse to do business with them. We can’t when it is the state…
And then there are those ‘clever’ commercial websites that won’t let you back out of…
…”Oh go on, sell me one then”, (as if). (probably coded by people who as kids wrote those pre-PC games where ‘quit’ and ‘continue’ had the same action).
I occasionally use some ads – just to find out a little more regarding a product or service – but will invariably compare with similar, only if I am actually intending to purchase same.
Apart from one or two technical tie-ins (computer/camera system etc.) I will always make price, total cost of ownership my main criteria – including quality, reliability etc. My decisions are always based on my own research and certainly not what some ad agency would have me believe.
AT least they’ve stopped trying to claim it’s thier “human rights” to trowel up shitty unwanted adverts.
And some people want to get rid of the BBC – which has NO ADVERTS.
There’s no pleasing some people.
It’s not the BBC, I want to get rid of, it’s the telly tax paid by people who don’t even watch it.
You don’t have to pay ‘telly tax’ if you don’t want to watch television at all.
Er, yeah, we know this. However, if you do want to watch television you have to pay the BBC even if you don’t want to watch the BBC. This is clearly wrong. Give it time and they will go for mobile devices because they are capable of showing television programmes. They have already mooted this. I don’t watch television on mobile devices, so would vigorously object to any such tax.
It’s time the BBC funded itself as other channels do.