Thankfully Microsoft is going to put pop-up blocking technology into Internet Explorer’s impending update which is due sometime next summer. Mozilla and Opera already offer such protection, and apparently 20-25% of web surfers have installed some form of pop-up protection.
Will the bubble burst for pop-up ads?
Stats say that Pop-Ups are 13 times more effective than traditional skyscraper banner advertising. There were some interesting quotes in the C-Net article about this though such as;
Major brand advertisers will be less affected because they have already been moving away from the format, Saridakis said. He said ad agencies and Fortune 500 companies view it as the “anti-Christ” because of consumers’ hatred of them. Response rates, although about three times better than those for banners, are often not worth the risk for big brands or publishers.
However, others seem unrepentant such as Gar Richlin, chief operating officer of Advertising.com.
“That format is going to be lost, and right now we don’t see what’s going to replace it,” Richlin said. “It’s an attention grabber and that’s what advertising is all about.
There’s no question there’s an absolute tension between the format and the population,” he said. “There’s nobody out there who’s going to get in front of this train.”
As someone who’s fought pop-ups on TSN.ca since I returned, I couldn’t be happier!