Advertising on the Web
Every company and business wants to get the word out that they have the latest and greatest product or service. And it is no secret that the easiest and fastest way to get the word out on a wide scale is on the web, but it seems like when it’s not done right, it ruins designs and is a distracting in the user experience. Does advertising belong on the web?
The easy answer to that would be no, because users go to sites for a specific reason: to get the information that they were looking for. I personally do not like most advertising on the web, unless it is very tastefully done, and does not distract me from getting the information I need. Google Adwords seems to me, to be the most simple form of this kind of advertising, and I can’t say that I’ve been distracted with them while browsing websites. It is not distracting, and has proved to be very effective.
Then there are other sites that seem to be dominated by ads, and it takes away from the overall experience. Now with a site like Techcrunch that makes around $70k a month from advertising, it would be hard to say no to advertisers, but at least don’t make it look like the advertising is more important than the content.
I can’t say that advertising does not belong on the web overall, however, there are certain places on the web where I just can’t stand seeing ads, and that is on personal blogs. If I am going to someone’s personal blog, I don’t need to see ads about ‘blogs’ and ‘custom web design’ or whatever. I want to read what is on that person’s mind. It’s amazing to see how many personal blogs are out there, dominated by Adwords. It immediately makes me think that they are in it for the money. It’s disappointing that it has attracted so many worthless bloggers just because they can easily “make money online”.
I will never have ads on my site. Maybe I’m just biased, but I’ve just never been a fan of seeing advertising on the web especially with blogs, and it seems that some sites just go overboard. I hate seeing design ruined by ads, and I’m sure I’m not the only person that feels that way. There has to be a better way to advertise on the web!
1 Comment
Good article. Adverts are good for those who either a) dont care about their website, or b) run websites made for the sole purpose of making money. I think adverts work on the web, but only on certain parts of the web, depending on the content of the site.
Web developers like us are bias by nature because we want to see everything perfect. Uunfortunately it wont ever be because people are making too much money on the internet.