Floating Ads Are Annoying But Effective (reg. req.)

Someday I’ll understand how annoying ads can be effective and I’ll be transformed into a megabucks consultant. Until then, Robert MacMillan’s excellent article on floaters and their various cousins will have to do. Why do washingtonpost.com, the hand that feeds him, and other news sites rely on ads that wander across news in a manner that wouldn’t be tolerated in other distribution forms? Because they work for advertisers like Wachovia, which started a campaign July 31 at washingtonpost.com hoping to get nearly 8,000 customers in a month and was up to almost 6,000 just past midpoint. New ad units at washingintonpost.com are reviewed by editors and can be rejected as too intrusive.
“We try to be sensible about it. We don’t want to annoy our users,” Chris Kelley, editor of Dallasnews.com, told MacMillan. “But by the same token, we have to pay our bills.”
The reality: as long as the ads continue to work with enough users, they’ll, well, continue.

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