Updating Google Chrome with native AdBlocker
Google & Better Ads or the league of advertising justice
A new AdBlocker in Google Chrome?
Hello! What's going on?
In case you are not aware, last February 15 Google made available to users the new version of Google Chrome with a native AdBlocker.
An Adblocker is a software whose purpose is to block advertising and make it disappear, thus avoiding the inconvenience it causes to the user.
Google's native AdBlocker comes installed by default with the latest update and is designed to block certain ad formats that are considered intrusive. You're probably wondering how this could affect your media and advertising revenue.
Google in this case is judge and jury. It is important not to forget the evolution of Google over the last 15 years, which has gone from being a growing company that generated sympathy and trust by being combative and irreverent with the almighty Microsoft and its Internet Explorer, to become the number 1 in Internet browsing thanks to the dominant position of its browser, Google Chrome. Google justifies the inclusion of a native AdBlocker to improve the experience of its users and continues to postulate itself as a defender of their interests. Even so, let's not forget that Google has come to control the display advertising market.
Google Adblock is the revised and updated version of pop-up blockers, but in 2018 it only blocks what it considers "intrusive" according to the guideline set by Coalition for Better Ads. The business model of AdBlockers like Eye/o is very well defined and accepted by users, but now we will analyze how Google AdBlock works.
How does Google AdBlock work?
Google AdBlock will determine which ads are intrusive if they do not meet Better Ads standards, the result of research and surveys of a sample of more than 40,000 users and their ratings of degrees of intrusiveness, such as full-page ads, ads with auto-playing video with sound and flash.
Ads will be filtered by Google Chrome with the intention of making the user experience more friendly even though it is both an issue of formats considered intrusive by users themselves, as well as the density and quantity of ads in the screen space and finally, countdown ads.
As expected, Google is getting tougher on mobile ad blocking, filtering out pop-up ads, ads that display before page content loads (with or without a countdown), auto-playing video ads with sound on, large sticky ads, ads developed with flash, full-screen ads with scroll, and pages with an ad density greater than 30%.
How does Google AdBlock filter ads?
Arbitration is the one Better Ads applies because Google tries to maintain a position of impartiality despite the fact that ultimately the ads displayed are the responsibility of the page owners. While browsing a page, Google Chrome filtering checks if the page does not meet Better Ads standards. If so, image and/or JavaScript requests are compared against lists of public patterns and rules filtered by EasyList (including Google's advertising platforms, AdSense and DoubleClick) with recognized ad URLs that violate the established standards and if a match is found, Google Chrome will block the request to download the advertisement.
Chrome automatically blocks ads to sites that do not meet Better Ads standards and displays a message to the user that an ad block has occurred and also an option to "allow ads on this site". In the desktop version the notification in Chrome will be in the address bar similar to the current pop-up blocker.
Ads will be removed from Chrome version 64, the latest version for both mobile and desktop versions.
What can you do if Google AdBlock blocks ads in your media?
The rating applied by Better Ads is: Passing, Warning or Failing depending on the number of violations of the standards defined by Better Ads. At any time you can know the evaluation status of a website by accessing the Ad Experience Report API and if you are the owner of the page you can learn more about the specific violations through the Ad Experience Report that you will find in Google Search Console.
Chrome will begin blocking ads on a website 30 days after being notified of standards violations if the reported issues are not resolved.
Keep in mind that if you are blocked from ads and do not review the Better Ads quality policy you may also be blocked from all other formats loaded on the web even those that do comply with the standards, Google Chrome AdBlocker will remove any ads on the page.
Even though the current situation in the advertising industry is a complicated one with many uncertainties, Google is making progress in the user experience and the advertising business, giving a warning to online businesses and especially to publishing projects, where those who make excessive and crude use of advertising will be left without advertising impressions and therefore, without income.
Once again, it shows that technology has a very important impact on the advertising business and those who are not attentive and well advised will be in a situation that sooner or later will be uncomfortable, to say the least.
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And finally, did you know...
In the next post we'll talk about Branded Content, the "non-intrusive" alternative to conventional advertising formats to generate awareness and affinity with your potential users. Is it enough to have imagination and a powerful message to achieve virality, visits, qualitative metrics...? We'll talk about it all.
