Pop-up Ads a Bad Way of Advertising

Bruno Mori

Pop-up Ads a Bad Way of Advertising
The Internet is a good way to advertise products because the Internet became a place where many people go to research or play. Advertisements are one of the ways that people is getting profit on the Internet. Since the Internet was created many companies developed strategies and plans to have some profit over it. Elenice Fucci a media director from an advertisement company said that “Everyone goes to the Internet for many different needs today; the media can target on the Internet any kind of public as television and radio.” The Internet became another way which companies in every country are using to advertise their product. The Internet has a very broad variety of information in any area. Therefore, it is a good tool for any kind of people.
There are four ways that companies are primarily advertising on the Internet. One of the ways is the Web Portals. Web Portals are sites that have lots of information about almost everything from news to sex. The customers have to sign up for the site or sign up for some kind service that the site provides like Internet support to have the access for the information. Sponsorships are the second way of advertisement, these sites works like a phone book. Companies pay for them to have their information like address and phone number included on the site. The best way of advertising on the Internet is the banner. Banners are advertisements usually put on the top of a site. The public can click on a banner to enter to a company’s site. The worse way to advertise on the Internet is the pop-up. As the name say pop-up ads pop-up when you enter a site in a different window. Pop-up ads are not a good way to advertise a company on the Internet because customers do not like the way it is presented.
Customers don like pop-up ads because they fell that pop-up ads are annoying. Pop-up ads make the Internet and computer speed slower while surfing. Even though many people already have cable or DSL high speed connection, some people still have dial-up connections that are really affected by every pop-up that appears. It usually opens when the customer does not want. It appears from the no where over the site that the customer is looking, so the customer has to take it out of the way. Most pop-up ads are irrelevant with non-important information that the customer does not need. Pop-up ads make people angry while using the Internet. Studies concluded that 78% of the Internet users think that pop-up ads are annoying and unnecessary (Stambler par.3).
Pop-ups are usually located on a place that is not suited for the product that is being advertised. Especially free web servers where anyone can have a personal website for free have pop-up ads on the personal websites. After a person creates a website a pop-up ad is inserted automatically on the site. A personal website usually has the person’s interests that changes from person to person. The free web servers do not know what the site will be about, so pop-up ads are randomly added on the site. This way companies could advertise computers on a soccer related site for instance. Usually people leave the site due to the pop-ups. Surveys in 1999 found out that the annoyance of the pop-ups makes 18% of the users think twice before revisiting a site that has pop-ups, but a survey in 2002 this percentage increased to 41% (Benitez par.3). Pop-ads that do not relate to the sites which are being visit make people lose the interest of the site.
Pop-up ads annoy people so much that people become scared by the pop-ups. Some people are scared that a virus can be attached to a pop-up, so they would not click on any of them. According to computer experts, pop-ups can crash your browser especially on low speed computers ending an Internet surfing and sometimes it the problems caused can be even worse (Calishain par.6). It is true that virus can be put on pop-up ads but the user would have to download something to have the virus on their computer; however, most users do not have knowledge about computers; thus, they would download with out knowing it. The viruses that are usually included in pop-up ads are the Trojans. Trojans would make someone’s computer a pop-up receiver which means that the computer would have pop-up ads all over the place. Pop-ups would start to show even though nobody is using the Internet. This is one of the biggest problems with pop-up ads. Some companies would include their pop-up on these Trojans making the customers crazy. They would lose their customer for sure in these circumstances. Other dangers of pop-up ads are fake information. Some information can be easily transformed. Advertisements like travel packages can be shown as a marvelous deal, but it would turn in as a bad deal. The fear of pop-ups is greater when the knowledge for computers a person has is lower. Also pop-up ads become ugly when porn sites start to appear everywhere. Children could access porn sites while looking for something else. Pop-up ads are not only annoying but they can bring problems.
The opposition argues that generally people do not like advertisements of any kind including the advertisements during television programs, so bad reactions may appear anyway (Moorey par.9). However, this type of advertisement on the Internet usually has information that is not useful when a person is researching about a specific topic. When someone is researching on the Internet this person is concentrated on the topic; advertisements can make people lose their thoughts. Especially pop-up ads which open in a new window of the browser makes people confused about that advertisement and the topic that is being researched. After many hours of research with no good results, pop-up ads would make someone angry because they would have to think about closing the pop-ups every time a new site is opening. Moreover, today people do not have much time during the day, so pop-up ads would be another way that someone would lose some precious time. Pop-up ads are worse for the customer when an important research is being done on the Internet.
There is a dispute between many companies because of pop-up ads because some companies want to advertise using pop-ups and other companies want to block the pop-up advertisements. Internet providers like AOL advertises their service saying that they have software that blocks pop-up ads. Customers that are welling to have Internet providers would want to have the AOL service because of the pop-up block that is provided. Other companies develop pop-up blockers to be sold. On the other hand, companies around the world that want to have their name on the Internet are creating new pop-up ads to the Internet. The pop-ups are winning the dispute; there are more pop-ups added than being blocked. Statistics show an increase in the number of pop-ups by 24% between 2002 and 2003 (Stambler par.2). This dispute between these companies is happening everyday, so that the customers are lots in the middle of the cycle.
The Internet is being polluted by this kind of advertisement. Customers are getting angry and annoyed by pop-ups, conflicts between companies are happening everyday and computers are having problems due to pop-ups. It is only the way to advertise that make a company successful on the Internet. Companies that are still advertising with pop-ups are not getting the profit expected with the advertisement; even though, statistics say that 40.6% of the United States population is online (Kayne 10). Other ways to advertise a product on the Internet should be chosen, so that a company can become well known. Sometimes it is better to choose a more expensive and more effective method than a cheaper and useless.



Works Cited

Benitez, Tina. “Television Pop-ups fizzle in a flash; disruptive advertisement grabs Internet users’ attention and gets a brand’s name out there, but it doesn’t keep consumers coming back for more.” Incentive Nov. 2002. Info Trac Web: Expanded ASAP. Lansing Community Coll. Lib. 22 Oct 2003.

Calishain, Tara. “Pop-ups flop up.” Searcher Apr. 2003. Info Trac Web: Expanded ASAP. Lansing Community Coll. Lib. 23 Oct 2003.

Stambler, Sarah. “Putting pop ups in perspective.” The E-Tactics Letter 30 Sept. 2003. Info Trac Web: Expanded ASAP. Lansing Community Coll. Lib. 22 Oct 2003.

Moorey, Suzane. “Pop-up advertising isn’t always bad news.” New Media Age 19 June. 2003. Info Trac Web: Expanded ASAP. Lansing Community Coll. Lib. 21 Oct 2003.
Kayne, Barbara and Norman J. Medoff. Just a Click Away , 1st ed. Massachusetts: Needham Heights, 2001.
Fucci, Elenice. Personal interview. 25 Oct. 2003.