Google Will Soon Start Punishing Mobile Sites that Use Annoying App Install Ads • Hacker News Board

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

#11

Post by gjolund » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:52 PM UTC

I'd really like to see a universal app / site rating service that judges apps / sites on their stability, privacy, security, legitimacy of requested permission, and general UX.

It could then provide alternatives to the app / site, and possibly even an anonymous whistleblower service for employees .

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

#12

Post by benbristow » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:52 PM UTC

thebokehwokeh2 wrote: post #3

They're looking at you http://www.ultimate-guitar.com

That website looks so dated nowadays. Really needs a revamp.

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

#13

Post by s3r3nity » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:53 PM UTC

ianphughes wrote: post #8

I still do not understand the popularity of this approach. It seems to crazy increase bounce rates. You would think that negative user behavior would already make these undesirable without Google being explicit?

As someone working in tech, and does digital marketing consulting, there is actually a lot of value in these interstitials: 1) Usually the app is infinitely better than the mobile web experience. You can chalk it up to prioritization of engineering working on iOS / Android app development over a mobile web experience -- usually for good reason. 2) It's a solid retention strategy. You can harp on about bounce rates reducing activation rates (bounce rates aren't as high as you might think btw in certain cases) but at the end of the day, a 1% increase in repeat purchase rate (or insert other retention metric here) will have a much much more significant impact than a 1% increase in activation.

It only works for certain scenarios and cases, but at the end of the day, there's significant data to show that they work.

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

#14

Post by Mahn » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:53 PM UTC

thebokehwokeh2 wrote: post #3

They're looking at you http://www.ultimate-guitar.com

As a beginner guitarist, this is site is the worst. It's a shame that honest sites like olga.net don't exist anymore.

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

#15

Post by alexbilbie » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:54 PM UTC

wlesieutre wrote: post #9

alexbilbie wrote: post #4

I hope they also stop serving adverts that redirect from Safari to the App Store too

I thought Safari doesn't even allow this anymore because of all the popup forwarder spam?

I still experience it every so often (iOS 8.4.1). The last time it happened it was on Techcrunch

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

#16

Post by jasonlotito » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:54 PM UTC

nilved wrote: post #5

What about sites that prompt you to enable push notifications?

That is a feature of the browser, and is on the browser to make it not annoying. While it's fair to say you might find it annoying and might not want to see it, others do find it valuable. If a browser feature is annoying you, the correct approach would be to disable that feature in the browser. If the browser doesn't allow you to do this, than it's the browser's implementation that is at fault.

This all assumes the site is using the features the browser makers are telling the sites to use.

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

#17

Post by madsushi » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:55 PM UTC

Seems a bit hypocritical, considering they were using app install interstitial pages as recently as July:

http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/google-...

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

#18

Post by volaski » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:56 PM UTC

justincormack wrote: post #10

Does this apply to "please subscribe to our stupid newsletter" that obscures many sites now?

I'm more annoyed with these sites than the app install sites. "Install our app" is annoying but still trying their best to send us where we will have better have better experience (at least that's what they think). These "subscribe to our newsletter" sites do it for their own good and couldn't care less about visitors. They do it so they can spam them with their emails

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

#19

Post by Mahn » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:57 PM UTC

madsushi wrote: post #17

Seems a bit hypocritical, considering they were using app install interstitial pages as recently as July: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/google-...

> Based on these results, we decided to permanently retire the interstitial.

Well at least they admitted they are bad, even if they tried them.

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

#20

Post by OJFord » Tue, Sep 01, 2015, 8:58 PM UTC

madsushi wrote: post #17

Seems a bit hypocritical, considering they were using app install interstitial pages as recently as July: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/google-...

Not really, seeing as the article you link addresses that?

It's like a car company saying "we used to only make black cars, but actually we looked into it, and now we think people want colours; so we're making them".