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Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

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Re: Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

#241

Post by reitanqild »

saidajigumi wrote: post #122
alkonaut wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tapatalk splash is a sure sign of a phpBB forum, meaning I won't find what I'm looking for anyway. Close tab. I can't believe those forums don't just migrate to Discourse.

> a phpBB forum, meaning I won't find what I'm looking for anyway. I'll have to disagree on this point. There are a lot of phpBB forums out there, and their quality and content varies widely as the Internet itself. Many of them, esp. some of the long-established ones, are invaluable sources for all sorts of arcana. Wikipedia doesn't even begin to touch the kinds of obscure practical knowledge embedded in the "dark we…

+1 on the discourse: Is anyone using it, like at all, except discourse? I have been waiting since it came for it to become a place for everything that Stack Overflow bans (non trivial questions that need discussion, "how can this be done in an elegant way" etc).

And: Can someone please please create a new stackoverflow that rewards solving problems instead of going full Daesh in destroying old artifacts, enforcing dumb rules etc?

Re: Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

#242

Post by bagacrap »

tzs wrote: post #198
matchu wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure what makes this abuse. Curating the content you serve isn't just okay ; it's one of the key value propositions of a search engine. The problem is when a content provider, for whatever reason, intentionally curates in a way that provides less value to the consumer.

One potential problem here is that this only applies to page blocking interstitials that promote an app. Page blocking interstitials that push signing up for a newsletter, for example, will not be penalized. It could be hard to argue that an interstitial pushing an app (especially an app specifically for the site the user is visiting that gives them enhanced features compared to the mobile web version of the site) is…

There's an alternative that is more user-friendly which the browser provides, but only for app install interstitials. Since there's no built-in alternative for other kinds of interstitials, it makes sense that they're left alone (although the crappier your site, the less time people spend on it, and presumably the farther it falls down the search results).

Also, the blog post states they're essentially calling these sites mobile-unfriendly, which I think is entirely fair. All full-page interstitials are annoying, on the mobile web or desktop web, but only "install our app" interstitials are unique to mobile. So if you view "mobile friendly" as meaning "as good as desktop web", banning bad things that are only relevant to mobile makes sense.

Re: Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

#243

Post by manigandham »

Best to read this twitter thread: https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893

This only applies to page covering ads for app installs. Not other interstitials. In fact Google recently did a study showing how 69% of people leave the page when faced with an interstitial [1], yet they also recently released an updated format for their own Google overlay ad [2] (although this is for apps). They don't want to lose web/search traffic to apps, but they make plenty of money running these formats themselves. A good summary of the various conflicts of interest is here [3].

1. http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/07/google-ca...

2. http://adwords.blogspot.com/2015/08/beautiful-new-designs-fo...

3. http://searchengineland.com/google-goes-app-interstitial-pro...

Re: Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

#244

Post by manigandham »

oaktowner wrote: post #97
squiggy22 wrote: post #77

Ha. Yet their advertising optimisation teams continue to tout the benefits of implementing an interstitial ad unit on mobile: https://developers.google.com/mobile-ads-sdk/docs/dfp/androi... Edit. More here: https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/products/mobile-ads-intersti... Left hand doesn't know what right hand is doing.

Those links appear to be about ads within apps, not on web pages. They can often be annoying, but that's different than interstitials on top of a mobile web site, right?

Yes, in-app is a very different environment from mobile web.

Also they only want to stop full page ads pushing to download the app, not any other full page ad.

Re: Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

#245

Post by Alphasite_ »

BorisMelnik wrote: post #68
jacquesm wrote: post #37

Does that mean they'll block youtube? Try playing a video on a phone that does not have the youtube app installed, it's just about impossible to get it right, it's a roulette that's rigged with more than half the links going to the youtube app page on google play. Highly annoying since there is no reason why the youtube page of some video should even have that app installation link at all.

is this true on iPhone as well?

Yes. If you have the app installed infuriatingly persistent, less so if you dont. Not having the app installed means you have to deal with the terrible youtube web player (which doesn't even use native fullscreen!).

Re: Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

#246

Post by YokoZar »

manigandham wrote: post #243

Best to read this twitter thread: https://twitter.com/mdudas/status/638792939842469893 This only applies to page covering ads for app installs. Not other interstitials. In fact Google recently did a study showing how 69% of people leave the page when faced with an interstitial [1], yet they also recently released an updated format for their own Google overlay ad [2] (although this is for apps). They don't want to los…

Sorry, but what?

What does an ad that shows between levels of angry birds on your phone have to do with ads blocking you from getting your search result?

This sounds like some weird sort of misdirection attempt.

Re: Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

#247

Post by IshKebab »

jfoster wrote: post #155
sgustard wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Per http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/09/mobile-fr... "After November 1, mobile web pages that show an app install interstitial that hides a significant amount of content on the transition from the search result page will no longer be considered mobile-friendly. This does not affect other types of interstitials." This implies the answer is No, since that's another type of interstitial (not an app instal…

Perhaps they're approximating by analyzing the page as a mobile user agent and a non-mobile user agent, then comparing.

Or they could just see if it contains links to the app/play store.

Re: Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

#248

Post by jbrooksuk »

reitanqild wrote: post #241
saidajigumi wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a phpBB forum, meaning I won't find what I'm looking for anyway. I'll have to disagree on this point. There are a lot of phpBB forums out there, and their quality and content varies widely as the Internet itself. Many of them, esp. some of the long-established ones, are invaluable sources for all sorts of arcana. Wikipedia doesn't even begin to touch the kinds of obscure practical knowledge embedded in the "dark we…

+1 on the discourse: Is anyone using it, like at all, except discourse? I have been waiting since it came for it to become a place for everything that Stack Overflow bans (non trivial questions that need discussion, "how can this be done in an elegant way" etc). And: Can someone please please create a new stackoverflow that rewards solving problems instead of going full Daesh in destroying old artifacts, enforcing du…

I tried Discourse for Cachet, but I just couldn't settle with it.

Re: Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads

#249

Post by pestaa »

kbenson wrote: post #226
choppaface wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

knowledge graph indeed steers traffic away from Wikipedia: http://searchengineland.com/businesses-knowledge-graph-domin... luckily the foundation hasn't seen a negative impact on donations.

I suspect that's because for the most part it just siphons off the traffic that would have mostly been a waste to serve anyway, being that they were either looking for such a small bit of information to be encapsulated in the excerpt, or they determined they were looking for something else, they would be hard to monetize. Then again, I could be wrong or there could be usefulness to users hitting the end site that isn…

Not saying you're wrong, but one strength of Wikipedia is the density of internal links, which even the summaries are full of.

Perhaps some users would explore a topic if they saw their many options to do so.

This is just pure speculation, though.

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