The internet is a constantly evolving place – in the time that I have been online (from 2010 onwards), there 
has been several Google search engine updates, the rise in HTML5 and mobile optimised websites that have all contributed to making the online-world we browse through the way it is now.
One element that became very popular when PPC advertising started to pick up pace was the use of ad blockers. These are plugins you can install onto web browsers that effectively prevent websites from loading certain code. The code that has been ‘black listed’ by the ad blocker software has been black listed since it is associated to advertising units on the website.
Of course, the main reason for the use of ad blockers is due to the frustration web users have in pop-up adverts and websites that ruin the user’s experience. This is generally why ad blockers are still in use in 2017.
Unfortunately, for website owners that do display contextual adverts, such as with PPC, and in limited quantity too, these website owner’s websites get penalised. This could be by as much as 40% of traffic that is preventing adverts from showing (as in the case with one of my websites).
Up till the last few years, there was not really much us website owners can do.
Until now…
There are plugins that are starting to get a lot of publicity online, for both Blogger, WordPress and other type of website platforms, that enable those that use ad blockers to block the web user from reading the content on the web page, that is until the web user disables the ad blocker that they are using. In essence, the plugins work by testing a bit of ‘bait’ code to see if it is allowed to load on the website or not. If it is, then the adverts on the website would be able to load and it is happy days. If the ‘bait’ code cannot load, due to the use of ad blockers, then then ad block blocker software blocks the web user from access to the content on the web page until the ad block is disabled.
Genius, right?
In some aspects, this is a welcome plugin to combat the fight against ad blockers. There are a lot of great websites out there that run simply down to the revenue that they produce from advertising.
I guess, though, it does put a conundrum on website owners:
- If a web user is using ad blockers, there is no way whatsoever that web user could make the website money from advertising.
- Therefore, it makes no difference to the revenue of the website whether that web user reads the content and explores the site – you are stating this from using ad block blocker software.
- This is why ad block blockers target these web users: to get them to start generating revenue.
I haven’t yet used ad block blockers on any of my websites simply because it would potentialy frustrate web users. But, I can definately see why people do use them. For this reason, it is definately worth trialing out such a plugin for a limited time to see what effect it had to your website.
