Last year Google announced it would be taking the initial steps to penalize intrusive ads (also known as intrusive interstitials or mobile pop-ups). The change was made to penalize the ranking of sites that used intrusive popups that are often annoying to mobile users and even cause them to leave a site completely. We detailed that update in on our blog here.
The newest announcement from Google stated that it will be cracking down even harder on sites that still aren’t complying with the guidelines. This is difficult for some businesses to swallow as they see a significant amount of their revenue coming from their popup CTAs or signups. It is not clear how a site that doesn’t not conform will be penalized in Google’s search ranking results, but it has been stated that these pop-up intrusive ads will be blocked when viewers are using the Chrome internet browser starting sometime in 2018. And these aren’t just spam style websites that will be penalized, any website with pop-ups or intrusive CTA’s, even promoting their own content, will be the target of these rules.
To help businesses understand what is acceptable and what is not, Google has worked with The Coalition for Better Ads to create a clear summary of a “bad ad”. A bad ad includes ads that interrupt, ads that distract and ads that clutter. Read the full description on those here. Google also created this graphic to display how different ad types affect mobile viewers experience on a website with ads.
It is clear that pop-up ads and ads with a countdown are highly annoying to website viewers on mobile, and even on desktop as shown in this graphic:
Google goes a step further to recommend 3 golden rules for a better user experience, including be immediate, be immersive and be relevant. Be immediate with fast loading ads that don’t slow down the loading of the actual content that the viewer wanted to see. Be immersive with ads that blend seamlessly into your website and its content, also called native advertising. Be relevant with ads that fit your consumers’ needs and interests. Read the full announcement from Google here, and create ads and an overall website experience that engages your potential customers instead of one that pushes them away with invasive and annoying advertising tactics.
Be prepared for these changes and start making an update to your website marketing strategy as soon as possible. For more information on internet marketing check out our blog at www.paveya.com/blog or contact us today at 1-855-372-8392.
