Soon You May Have To Pay For Every Time Your Computer Caches A Song Copy

Repeat After Me: Advertising Need Not Be Intrusive

from the it's-a-myth dept

Mon, Jun 5th 2006 11:12pm — Mike Masnick

For years and years we've been trying to shoot down the myth that advertising needs to be intrusive. As has been shown again and again and again, when the advertisers recognize that ads are content they don't need to be intrusive at all. Rather, they can become viral, as people not only seek them out, but actively distribute and promote the advertisements for you. This is especially true in a world where there is no captive audience. Thinking that ads need to be somehow intrusive is only bound to cause trouble long term. However, it's tough to get rid of old habits in the ad industry, apparently. The Washington Post is running an article looking at the latest in intrusive online advertising, made up of ads that dance across your screen and try to capture your attention. The article repeats the myth of intrusive advertising, claiming that the holy grail is avoiding "too intrusive" and finding the ad that is "just intrusive enough." That's the wrong way to think about it. While it may be a step forward that advertisers are finally recognizing there's such a thing as "too intrusive," they'd be much better off recognizing that they can succeed without being intrusive at all. In fact, as you read the article, what becomes clear is the successful intrusive ads aren't successful because they're intrusive, but because they're actually engaging.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

8 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

anonymous coward, 5 Jun 2006 @ 11:19pm

www.shaveeverywhere.com

best viral marketing ever
[ link to this | view in thread ]
technofreak, 6 Jun 2006 @ 1:33am

So true
I so wish that these so called advertising gurus would wake up and realise that by attacking people you actually drive them away.

Sure you will get the gullible suckers who believe all those stupid pop-ups and make-believe scenes....but...you are not fooling the next geners who can smell a internet rat from a mile away....
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 6 Jun 2006 @ 3:21am

Most of the time when I get an ad like this I dont even see what it is for I just look for the small X that lets me close it...

But if I do see what the ad is for I have never bought anything it advertised just because they already annoyed me.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 6 Jun 2006 @ 5:51am

Intrusive ads are actually a turn off to me. If a company has to resort to damn near forcing to watch their ad then chances are the product isn't worth it.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Andy Huckaba, 6 Jun 2006 @ 8:45am

By and large, ads are intrusive when they are not relevant to their audience. Once relevant, they have content value. The answer is, send the right ads to the right people.

Good post! Intrusive advertising is an old habit of the ad industry that is having trouble dying.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Petréa Mitchell, 6 Jun 2006 @ 10:18am

And that's why I have NoScript added on to my Firefox copy, and will add FlashBlock if I ever decide to install the Flash plug-in...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Aaron, 7 Jun 2006 @ 6:38am

AIM
I know AOL has used very intrusive ads in their IM program. That is one of the main reasons I stopped using the program altogether. So not only was the advertising ineffective but it caused them to loose a customer, and I am also very active about telling people about alternative IM clients because of the ads. Andy you couldn't be righter. I think one more thing that companies have to realize is that the internet isn't just used for buying things. Sometimes we just want a quiet session of talking to our friends or sending an e-mail or researching something. We don't want or have time to worry about buying something whether we need it or not.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 27 Jun 2006 @ 7:56pm

bla
bla
[ link to this | view in thread ]