For the advertising industry and the publishers who depend on it, ad blocking has become a very real problem. So much so that the Interactive Advertising Bureau, a digital advertising trade group, has created a primer on how sites can best block the ad blockers.
The IAB has come up with its own catchy acronym—D.E.A.L.—as well as a freely available ad blocking detection script to help publishers stymie potential threats to their revenue streams.
While there are no reliable figures about how many people use ad blockers today, the consensus in the industry is that the threat is growing. Much of the web, after all, runs on ads. So as more consumers use ad blockers, the more it theoretically cuts into publishers and advertisers' revenue.
How does the IAB say publishers should D.E.A.L? Its recommendations are ultimately pretty simple. The D.E.A.L method, it says, encourages a publisher to detect a blocker; explain the value of advertising for the publisher to the reader; ask the reader to either turn off their ad-blocker or pay for the content, and then lift the restricted access if the reader complies.
The problem is that readers' issues with ads may run deeper than such an approach suggests. Readers are frustrated with intrusive ads as well as pesky trackers and even dangerous malware that can piggyback on ads. The IAB has tried to deal with these problems by offering recommendations on how advertisers and publishers should clean up their ads with lean, encrypted, non-invasive alternatives. But, for the most part, those changes have yet to be seen. "We're still very early on," says Scott Cunningham, the senior vice president of technology and ad operations at the IAB.
The IAB outlines other tactics for confronting ad blocking, as well: offer tiered experiences (so a reader can read, say, three articles per month with the ad blocker turned on; demand payment from readers (like, say, a subscription); reinsert ads around the blocker; and pay visitors for their time with ads (like, say, offering game credits).
Whether any of this works to undermine ad blockers remains to be seen. Readers aren't happy with the ads being served up—and how they're being served. As a range of publishers—including The New York Times and WIRED itself—wrestle with ad blocking, the question is ultimately whether publishers and their readers can reach a place where everyone feels like they're on the same team.
