Disallowing Adblockers

[Sam1]

I can think of a few site niches where allowing visitors to block ads will severely limit revenue. One example would be the proxy niche. They generally get paid per impression and some proxy webmasters place adsense ads on their homepages. With ad-blockers, they may not be able to pay their hosting bills.

Do you think webmasters should start blocking people who use ad-blockers if they have no other way of generating revenue?

I know that people say things like:

"They may exclude the site from an adblocker if they like it."

- I find that unlikely for a number of sites: proxies, adsense niche sites and blogs. It's a hassle to unblock ads and most people simply forget to do so.

"It's persons choice to view ads."

- Not really. It should be the content owners choice. TV, Radio, Spotify all have ads to help pay for the content they are giving away for free. People have a right not to visit a webpage if it is overloaded with ads but most websites are not.

Thoughts?

 

[x9751]

An entire website that blocks you out and doesn't let you see anything unless you disable ad-block? Hmm I would certainly go for showing them only basic stuff while making it so they can't see the best stuff unless they disable ad-block. To go so far as to block them completely might not benefit you. Personally I think it is well within the rights of the web owner to block anyone they wish. Of course if you are the type to just throw ad's everywhere... Well you shouldn't really be surprised if a person wants to block them. Other than all that I would agree with you 100%

 

[Jordan]

I would not block anyone from viewing the site, However, I have been debating if I should implement this or not:
http://xenforo.com/community/resources/jaxels-implementation-of-ad-block-detection.2160/
This will basically just display a banner. I know I have done so on some of my previous sites. But those type of sites it did not matter if it gained any more viewers or not. The people came to that site wanting stuff, if they left without it was not my problem.

Sites like forums I would probably only display a banner to ask them to turn it off while viewing the site. With that said, I would never block access to the entire site.

I know over at the other thread "Getting members to accept ads?" this was discussed a bit.
Also with Google Removes Adblock Plus From Playstore

 

[Jason1]

I don't block any ads, as too make use of ads in my site.

 

[JLogan]

I think there is only a small percentage of people who actually block ALL ads. Most of the people I know who use Adblock whitelist things they regularly visit.

 

[Sam1]

I think there is only a small percentage of people who actually block ALL ads. Most of the people I know who use Adblock whitelist things they regularly visit.

Well that is not my experience. I see people just blind blocking all ads and you can see why, they're annoying.

 

[JLogan]

I see people just blind blocking all ads and you can see why, they're annoying.

Not all ads are annoying, and even adblocker has its own whitelist of sites they don't block ads on. It's sites that overuse ads, or have ads that intervene with the experience. If you have one or two ads on your site, then most people will whitelist you if they use the site a lot, and you ask nicely.

I rarely find ads annoying. Sites need them to earn revenue, and I understand that.

 

[rick]

If blocking ads and or blocking people who block ads inspires innovation then I'm all for both!!
There is more to the story then ad-blocker :wink:

 

[Shole]

Ads are optional for everyone, I dont think anyone likes them on other sites. And I dont think we should block people just because they dont want to see ads. Its their right to do so if they want to. I mean who didnt do that at one point. There are sites that have 1 funny picture and 1000 of ads all around it, the ad blocker comes in handy there

 

[JLogan]

Ads are optional for everyone, I dont think anyone likes them on other sites. And I dont think we should block people just because they dont want to see ads. Its their right to do so if they want to. I mean who didnt do that at one point. There are sites that have 1 funny picture and 1000 of ads all around it, the ad blocker comes in handy there

Couldn't agree more, but there's some weird shit going down in the Adblocking world. They are charging businesses like Google to have their ads unblocked, and Google paid. So, people think that Adblock Plus will block all ads, but the reality of it is that if you pay then you can get whitelisted. Which sucks for both ends.

 

[Shole]

Interesting I didnt know that. Well its a lose/lose situation. Why? Well if people wouldnt overflow their sites with ads than people wouldnt have to use adblockers. I mean common everyone knows those pop up ads that you want to kill everyone on that site xD

 

[JLogan]

Interesting I didnt know that. Well its a lose/lose situation. Why? Well if people wouldnt overflow their sites with ads than people wouldnt have to use adblockers. I mean common everyone knows those pop up ads that you want to kill everyone on that site xD

I actually don't mind pop-up ads if it's only one or two.

 

[Shole]

I actually don't mind pop-up ads if it's only one or two.

Yeah, that can pass by, but what if you read a blog and every click and every 10 min you get a pop up, thats just crazy, and to much.

 

[Sam1]

There are two main adblock companies- I believe- the paid whitelist one is absolutely extortionist. Its amazing that Google is allowing a small company to hold it to ransom. What they should do is install stop adblock code into their ads. Google's ads are not intrusive in any way. If they took a stand then the millions of people using adblock would find it very hard to navigate the web because they would constantly have to pause or whitelist sites. Therefore they would be encouraged to stop using adblock. A better version of adblock would be where you personally have your own blacklist of ads.

 

[rick]

As I said in my previous post, there's more to the story than ad-blocker.
It is trivial, to block anything coming in to your computer.
Personally, I run my own DNS (Unbound) on each pc and resolve certain domains to localhost.
This can be done just as easily by editing your "hosts" file.
IMHO, Ad-blocker is a tiny player in the advertising field, real innovation won't come from dwelling and countering such a small player, lets look at the bigger picture. :wink:

 

[OhioTom76]

I wouldn't block users who are blocking ads. You are really just shooting yourself in the foot by doing this. If they are blocked from viewing the content because they are blocking ads, they will more than likely bounce and just go elsewhere - which is bad for your SEO. Even if they aren't clicking your ads, they are contributing to your overall site traffic and contributing to the average time on site for users.

 

[Sam1]

I wouldn't block users who are blocking ads. You are really just shooting yourself in the foot by doing this. If they are blocked from viewing the content because they are blocking ads, they will more than likely bounce and just go elsewhere - which is bad for your SEO. Even if they aren't clicking your ads, they are contributing to your overall site traffic and contributing to the average time on site for users.

I suppose it depends on the type of site you are running. If you are running a user generated site such as a forum then it wouldn't necessarily be smart to disallow adblockers. However, if you are creating the content then having traffic which isn't contributing to revenue is pretty useless. Sure - it looks nice to have that traffic but you may as well not have had it at all.

 

[OhioTom76]

I suppose it depends on the type of site you are running. If you are running a user generated site such as a forum then it wouldn't necessarily be smart to disallow adblockers. However, if you are creating the content then having traffic which isn't contributing to revenue is pretty useless. Sure - it looks nice to have that traffic but you may as well not have had it at all.

It can be frustrating to realize a percentage of your traffic is using Ad Blockers, but in reality these same users would probably not be clicking any ads anyhow if AdBlock didn't exist.

Google looks at hundreds of metrics for organic and paid search. While Click Through Rate of your SERPs is an important metric to them, so is the bounce rate of the traffic they are sending to your site. Even if your listings in the search engine results might attract a user to click through to your site, if they are getting there and immediately departing (such as if you were denying them access due to using AdBlockers), then that is sending Google signals that there is a poor user experience on your site.

More users, even if they are blocking ads, still contribute to more activity on your site which affects your overall SEO. So, indirectly they are still helping out if they are allowed to participate.

 

[Sam1]

It is disputable whether or not bounce rate does affect SEO. You may wish to read: http://www.webpronews.com/matt-cutts-google-doesnt-use-bounce-rate-2012-06

 

[JLogan]

I'm not sure if yall noticed, but it seems a lot more content producers are starting to stand up against adblockers. I'm even considering joining "the fight" and to start displaying stern messages/completely blocking adblockers.