It’s time for publishers to take ad blocking seriously.
I wrote an article two years ago stating that when it comes to ad blocking, ignoring their impact or sticking to inadequate strategies is not viable nor sustainable. Yet here we are in 2021 and many publishers still have no strategy in place.
Right now, the blissfully ignorant tend to fall into two camps. Those who say they don’t have the time to accurately measure the impact of ad blocking and those who believe ad blocking doesn’t affect them. REALLY!
Then there are those that are being lulled into a false sense of security by ad block detection tools that themselves are being blocked.
Two years ago I highlighted that ad blockers prevent many of these tools from loading but it was still early days in terms of quantifying the impact. Today we have those answers and it’s not pretty. So here are the facts.
The Detection Tools Don’t Work
Most ad block detection tools used by publishers today including from the IAB don’t work because they are built in Javascript or focus on what’s called “element hiding” to detect ad blockers. These are easily blocked by ad blockers.
To prove the point, we have built our own ad block detection technology to measure the true impact of ad blocking for publishers and make side by side comparisons.
I have heard publishers say their ad blocking rate is 5% only to find out that the reality is 10% to 17% higher. So at the lowest level, we are seeing 15% of site visitors using ad blockers.
The facts are that ad blocking is used by 45% of consumers across the North America population and that represents some 166 million people that do not see traditional digital advertising. That’s a massive untapped, unreachable audience for many publishers.
Publishers who ignore ad blocking are missing out on a huge opportunity and advertisers are waking up to the missed opportunity.
Advertisers Need To Reach Ad Block Audiences
Advertisers are now realizing that they are not reaching a significant part of their target audience thanks to the use of ad blockers. This is unacceptable to them and the challenge gets worse for advertisers who target specific audience demographics, for example, tech-savvy, educated millennials where ad blocking can exceed 40%. We are currently working with some of the largest brands in the world to address this challenge using our proprietary permission-based advertising platform.
But for brands to achieve their objectives requires enlightened publishers who share a common view when it comes to ad blocking and have taken action to remedy its impact.
Right now there is a real “winners and losers” scenario in play, between those that implement solutions that positively address ad blocking and those that ignore the challenges facing them. Ignorance is a sure-fire way to lose advertisers and the critical revenue stream they represent.
So What Do Publishers Do Now?
It’s time for publishers take action. Billions of brand new advertising dollars are available to those who do so.
They say knowledge is power so firstly it is vital for publishers to truly understand the real impact ad blocking is having on their business. To assist them, we provide our ad block detection capabilities free of charge.
Then publishers must adopt permission-based advertising strategies and technology that gives consumers control, asking them for their permission to show ads. It’s simple, straight forward and it works.
To ignore ad blocking is a massive missed opportunity whichever way you look at it. But be advised, trying to subvert ad blocking through ad reinsertion techniques that disrespects the consumer has potentially catastrophic consequences.
