#1173 Click Thru Wait

I recently watched a “webinar” on online advertising. It was, I suppose, intended to show how companies could use web advertising to get “web-inue.”
But to me it also showed how bad the web can be. Because, thanks to the computerized analytics available with web ads, you can actually tell who acted on the ad.
This was supposed to be the promise of web advertising. It wouldn’t just be a display ad, it would provoke the ad viewer to actually act, by clicking on the ad and going to another website or offer. Direct confirmation that advertising works.
Unfortunately, that’s not how advertising works. Most of the time the goal of advertising is served well by a suggestion on the radio or a display. You’ll act when you get around to it. And you’ll act with an impulse that is subconsciously directed by a good ad.
That’s the “incumbent theory” of advertising: You’re more likely to vote for the name on the ballot you find most familiar, and that is likely to be the incumbent because you’ve heard about him or her more.
In any event, the magic acronym of web advertising is CTR. It stands for Click Through Rate—the rate at which viewers of the ad actually click it to explore further. That rate is .03%. That’s right, .03%. 3% is 3 out of a 100, .3% is 3 out of a 1000, .03% is 3 out of 10,000. Or one out of 3300. Not very good when you get down to it.
Why is that? Because of that other acronym I just now created, FOV—Fear Of Viruses. Most folks don’t click ads on the web because they are afraid doing so will open up their computers to examination and exploitation by some nefarious unscrupulous company.
FOV is a derivative of the basic human emotion summed up by the acronym, FOBS—Fear Of Being Screwed.
When someone fobs off a dirty job on you, you’re screwed. And when a web advertiser fobs off a bad deal on you, you’re screwed too.
Web advertising’s next challenge? How to increase CTR by minimizing FOBS.
My suggestion? Click the link on my trusted blog for more on how...
America, ya gotta love it.