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F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

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Re: F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

#121

Post by mplscoder »

gk1 wrote: post #36

In case you're wondering why anyone would use these _obviously_ annoying popups, here's why: If done right, they actually work. Here's a real example: In March I added a delayed popup to my blog to invite people to subscribe for future updates about user acquisition. It was on a delayed timer so that the reader has a chance to at least get part-way through the post. Also, if you closed it out once then you wouldn't s…

How many people left the page before bothering to close the popup? That's the metric I care about (and usually my behavior)

Re: F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

#122

Post by TheLoneWolfling »

wernercd wrote: post #86
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no way I finish reading anything that pops up halfway through. That's just more callous manipulation of my browser. I leave instantly. If the back button doesn't work, I kill it. How many of those 11,848 people didn't finish your article? Do you care?

How many people stop watching Friends or The Walking Dead because of a commercial? How many sales are made because of the commercials? I'm all for adblockers... but to say that ads can't be unobtrusive and effective is ignoring the fact that they are obviously worth the effort.

I did.

I pretty much gave up on TV because of the commercials.

Re: F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

#123

Post by TheLoneWolfling »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #3

Are there any good pop-up blockers for ads like these? I know one of Firefox's original USP's was having a built-in popup blocker because popups were so annoying back then, so why not for these?

You have to do it either on a per-site blacklist or heuristically.

Though I'm waiting for something like NoScript that allows JS modification to remove annoyances like this.

Re: F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

#124

Post by TheLoneWolfling »

amyjess wrote: post #39
techtalsky wrote: post #14

You know, the age of ACTUAL pop-up windows really sucked, and it was amazing when browsers rendered them largely obsolete by limiting how websites could launch another window but at least all of those had the X in the SAME EXACT PLACE. The new crop of lightboxed modal popups that are now ubiquitous are 100 times worse since they: - are modal - often work poorly on mobile - have as many different dismiss mechanisms as…

I really wish there was a way to globally disable all lightboxes without having to disable JavaScript entirely. Maybe a Machine Learning model to prevent scripts from executing if the classifier indicates it will spawn a lightbox...

Something as simple as checking that nothing dynamic blocks too much text would detect most of them currently.

But it quickly turns into a cat-and-mouse game.

Re: F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

#125

Post by gk1 »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #102
gk1 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a good question, and I do care. And because I know the HN crowd is less tolerable of these things, I actually had a filter to NOT show it to visitors referred by HN. And now, as I mentioned, I'm experimenting with a different type of prompt that I hope will lower that risk.

Wow, that's cynical. You want HNers to spread the word, so they get a sanitized version? That's borderline creepy. Now I recommend a site, and the people I recommend to are thinking I'm an idiot for recommending an ad-riddled site.

No. I'm slightly customizing the experience for a certain group of visitors.

Do you find web analytics creepy? Or A/B tests? Or cookies? If you think your browsing behavior isn't affecting what you're served on a site, then you're in for a surprise...

Re: F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

#126

Post by Alupis »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #116
Alupis wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At least for me. You are not the average internet user. Your biases do not apply to 99% of internet users. The things on websites that annoy you do not annoy 99% of internet users. The marketing antics that work for 99% of internet users do not work on you.

Wrong. Netflix is the larger part of the internet. That has nothing to do with me.

You provide one example of a single website out of millions that does not use a popup, and claim QED?

Like stated before... you are letting your personal bias creep into a pseudo-fact.

Re: F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

#127

Post by jgaxn »

mplscoder wrote: post #121
gk1 wrote: post #36

In case you're wondering why anyone would use these _obviously_ annoying popups, here's why: If done right, they actually work. Here's a real example: In March I added a delayed popup to my blog to invite people to subscribe for future updates about user acquisition. It was on a delayed timer so that the reader has a chance to at least get part-way through the post. Also, if you closed it out once then you wouldn't s…

How many people left the page before bothering to close the popup? That's the metric I care about (and usually my behavior)

We ran a test of info-gathering popups on one of my sites a little while back. We split tested using various triggers.

popup after 5 seconds:

- 73.5% left the page without closing the popup.

popup after 10 seconds:

- 75.8% left the page without closing the popup.

popup triggered when the user scrolled near the bottom of the page:

- 21.5% left the page without closing the popup.

The scroll trigger was pretty useless though because only 2.6% of users scrolled low enough to trigger it.

Re: F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

#128

Post by true_religion »

jgaxn wrote: post #127
mplscoder wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many people left the page before bothering to close the popup? That's the metric I care about (and usually my behavior)

We ran a test of info-gathering popups on one of my sites a little while back. We split tested using various triggers. popup after 5 seconds: - 73.5% left the page without closing the popup. popup after 10 seconds: - 75.8% left the page without closing the popup. popup triggered when the user scrolled near the bottom of the page: - 21.5% left the page without closing the popup. The scroll trigger was pretty useless t…

I'm curious... is that 75.8% a bounce rate from the entire site, or just navigating away from the page?

Re: F*** those popups – signing up those who deserve it

#129

Post by notdanariely »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #116
Alupis wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At least for me. You are not the average internet user. Your biases do not apply to 99% of internet users. The things on websites that annoy you do not annoy 99% of internet users. The marketing antics that work for 99% of internet users do not work on you.

Wrong. Netflix is the larger part of the internet. That has nothing to do with me.

In case you aren't just being argumentative, using bandwidth as the metric of choice when discussing lightbox-style page elements is sub-optimal. Or when discussing business models of websites that use those page elements.

A better metric is some sort of pageviews / site visitors / uniques / etc.

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