Comments on: Oh No, say it isn’t so…Pop Ups are back!!!

By: Dean

Dean — Sun, 13 Feb 2011 15:50:35 +0000

I am an "Average Joe" and they annoy the heck out of me – that's way I am here on this site. I opted out but I am still getting the pop-ups

By: Fazza

Fazza — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 17:06:06 +0000

Hi Kevin! Been reading your blog for a few weeks now & find it extremely valuable! So – before I weigh in w/my two cents, just wanted to say "hello" and "thank you!"

I'm a no on pop ups. I'm techie, and generally read blogs through RSS . . . however I also have a habit of opening selected posts into multiple tabs (so I can "mark all as read" and get to the ones I want to spend more time reading as the day goes on). I generally tend to fall outside the norm , so I'm not sure that tells you anything!

That said, I don't know if it's just your regular readers that are the best to answer this. As *new* reader to any blog, I'm going to go to the actual page – so the first impression is not based on an RSS feed.

If a website even had cutsie help text or decoration on every one of their links, it would bug me – so those pops ups just feel spammy to me. I'm not sure if it would turn me off of a site per se, but there is a initial gut reaction/first impression that the writer chose monetization over form/style/aesthetics/readability.

Then again, I tend to gravitate to more of the design blogs, so I guess it would stand out more in those cases (i.e., not practicing what they preach!)

By: Leroy Brown

Leroy Brown — Fri, 04 May 2007 17:48:58 +0000

I know the month is only 3 days old, but I'm seeing absolutely ridiculous Kontera stats so far this month. Over Double the daily average from last month, with only slightly more traffic.

So in my case, I'd say yes, it's definitely justifiable.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Fri, 04 May 2007 13:19:29 +0000

some bloggers are seeing good returns – its something i dont contest. As you say though – is it justifiable?

By: StockTube

StockTube — Fri, 04 May 2007 13:16:28 +0000

i agreed kontera is pissing me off but surprisingly the requirement to be part of kontera family is very high … just wondering if the money made by publishers who deploy them is justifiable … are they paying very well?

By: Kevin

Kevin — Thu, 03 May 2007 23:34:40 +0000

hey stuart

thanks for dropping by.

i started subscribing to your blog the other day however whenever i check new posts etc i usually just open the link up on a new page instead of using the feedreader. force of habit i guess

By: Stuart

Stuart — Thu, 03 May 2007 23:29:57 +0000

Most regular readers will read the blog from their feed reader I would assume which is ad free

By: Leroy Brown

Leroy Brown — Thu, 03 May 2007 06:42:49 +0000

I've spent a lot of time observing average / regular internet users. A lot. It's something I think we should all do, so we can get a better idea of what works and what doesn't.

Based on my observations, I'd say that very little *really* annoys the average user. Old school popups, when they come in bunches, do the trick. So does a slow-loading site. But in text ads, I haven't personally seen that to be a big annoyance to the average joe.

By: Armen : : iffect.net

Armen : : iffect.net — Wed, 02 May 2007 22:48:21 +0000

I actually posted about this a couple of days ago (you get ignored when your blog is about 50 hours old) lol

Having tried Kontera, I find them obtrusive.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Wed, 02 May 2007 22:19:24 +0000

leroy – i dont know how can you assume that its only 'techy' people who are annoyed with these advertisements. Was it only techy people who get annoyed with pop ups and pop unders? You need to give more credit to the average internet user anyways – theres a generation of people growing up knowing the internet from childhood. I personally didnt know anything about the internet until my first of university in 1996.

have your readers not said anything about the ads yet?

chris – yeah i know. i think you did the right thing removing the ads

By: Leroy Brown

Leroy Brown — Wed, 02 May 2007 21:48:15 +0000

I'd bet ( though there's no way to know for sure ) that most people who truly hate Kontera ads are the "techy" type people, or advanced internet users. Most of those folks likely read their favorite blogs through RSS, and thus never see the Kontera ads.

The average user isn't likely to be bothered as much by the ads, I would think.

By: Brian Heys

Brian Heys — Wed, 02 May 2007 16:27:42 +0000

I totally agree. These ads are intrusive, irritating, and I have never clicked on one yet.

By: Chris Stark

Chris Stark — Wed, 02 May 2007 12:18:28 +0000

The funny thing is, Kontera actually has a really high expectation for new sites. I think you have to have 500,000+ pageviews a month to even get considered.

The reason you are sort of seeing them more then you probably should is that John Chow offered up an ability for smaller sites to sign up under his account.

I personally signed up, tried it out for one day and found that I didn't even like reading my own site because mousing over those ads and seeing the popups was annoying as hell.

I removed it the same day! It definitely wasn't worth it for the maybe 20 bucks it would have earned me in a month anyway…