The Threat
On the 6th of March, 2010, Ars Technica published a piece that explained how ad blocking is ruining your favorite sites. This wasn’t the only time that an author on some high-profile online publisher made such a statement. The BBC also dove into the subject on the 18th of September, 2015, with several experts pitching in regarding the death of free content on websites due to ad blockers. This makes it appear as if ad blockers are really a nuisance, doesn’t it? Some of the people interviewed argue that the amount of capital flowing to publishers from ads is going to diminish to zero if people continue to download ad blockers and utilize them at the current rate.
Why Ad Blockers Are Really Not a Threat
Most of the people who talk about the threat presented by ad blockers come from advertising agencies themselves. Yes, using their current business models, advertising platforms may lose some part of their revenue as ad blocking becomes more popular. The thing is that innovation doesn’t stop with products like AdSense. In all likelihood, either ad publishers or advertising platforms themselves will find ways to adapt to the ways of ad blockers.
Everything Is an Ad!
Publishers and advertising platforms often fight a tough battle with ad blockers. However, the publishers have one more advantage: They have more flexibility to get around ad blockers even when they are working perfectly and removing every sign of scripted ad content. Having a raw HTML tag, for example, would still have a chance of displaying an ad. Providers cannot replicate this since they depend on JavaScript for syndication. Aside from that, there are also companies willing to sponsor certain articles published on a site for which the site earns a certain amount of cash.
Everything and anything can be an ad. YouTube videos often have product placements or reviews, which may have come about as a result of a payment from a company to the person recording the video. In text-based media, any mention of any company can be an advertisement. As the number of users visiting sites with an ad blocker increases, the market will be incentivized to adapt and implement models like these.
Conclusion
Before I let you move on from this article, there’s one more thing I forgot to mention: People using ad blockers are, in all likelihood, the kinds of people who already ignore ads. Since the most popular method of advertising is pay-per-click (PPC), then in the grand scheme of things the sites hosting the ads have experienced no loss by having someone who would have otherwise just seen ads, been annoyed by them, and moved on without giving up a single click. Only sites that receive payment per 1000 views (PPM) would have a loss because of ad blockers, and those kinds of ads are few and far between. Do you think ad blockers are trouble, or are they a great innovation that allows people to browse the Web undisturbed?
