Dive Brief:
- Ad-blocking tech is a worldwide phenomenon and UK publisher The Guardian is hoping to solve the issue with something besides an ad-free subscription model or making the visitor just deal with the status quo.
- The new idea is still being formulated, but the goal is to find a way to put the website visitor in control of their ad experience on the site.
- The issue is something The Guardian wants to stay on top of given a recent report from the IAB and YouGov found 18% of U.K. adults use ad-blocking tech, a figure up 15% from June.
Dive Insight:
The typical way publishers have handled intrusive, unwanted ads for visitors is to offer an ad-free subscription version. Anyone who didn’t pony up was served with ads they probably didn’t want to see. In return those users are increasingly turning to ad-blocking technology, and its use seems to be growing possibly in part due to an increase in media coverage – especially after Apple added ad-blocking technology to the mobile Safari browser in iOS 9 earlier this fall.
The Guardian is actively looking for a fresh approach to the problem that makes its users’ advertising experience a bit better. Global Revenue Director Tim Gentry said the idea is to put the user in control, explaining to Digiday, “Offering a customized ad experience is an area I’m most interested in, and one in which we’ve yet to experiment. I don’t know how we do it, or how exactly it will work yet because it’s that early, but it’s a fascinating area to explore.”
The paper's first stab at fighting ad-blocking software was to serve a message to visitors using the tech reminding them the ads fund its content and pointing them to the membership page. The new approach is in line with the Interactive Advertising Bureau's latest public statements that digital advertising needs to start taking the user experience into mind from the beginning, rather than trying to maximize ad revenue.
