Are Your Mobile Gaming Users Suffering From Ad Blindness?

Ad blindness has been an important topic for years in the marketing industry. More recently with mobile apps utilizing ads to help with monetization the concern has been raised about whether or not your mobile gaming users are suffering from ad blindness. Mobile games and other types of mobile apps can be very prone to this issue and as a mobile app developer ourselves we are very aware of the problem and how it can then affect revenue.

So are your mobile app users suffering from ad blindness, and if so what can you do about it?

The concept of Ad Blindness

The concept of ad blindness has been around for years. It gained notoriety as internet banner ads gained popularity along with pop-ups as a way to increase ad revenue. Now those ad issues have migrated to the app world as well.

Part of the problem is that we as humans are being conditioned to ignore ads. First off we are constantly having ads thrown at us on all mediums from TV to videos to banner ads. As with everything in life some are good, some are bad and some are ugly. The good and great ads then set the tone of expectation we have sometimes resulting in people actually paying attention to the ads because they are cute, funny or clever.

Other ads are judged more harshly even being ridiculed for being unappealing or in the case of the recent Pepsi ad, being incredibly insensitive.

When you are on a mobile device and using apps you are now regularly subjected to ads. Again, some are actually interesting enough that we pay attention the first or second time we see it. But then we see it a third, fourth and fifth time in a single session. Then the ad is repeated the next day and the day after so soon enough you have seen the same ad hundreds of times and are now completely blind to it.

The problem is not with ad itself, but instead that as a marketer we are providing users with a poor user experience by subjecting them to the same ad over and over creating the blindness.

The need for Ad Diversity

No matter how fun or entertaining an ad is, it loses all aspects of entertainment or interest after a dozen or more views. If the goal of the ad is to generate installs then creating a scenario of ad blindness which then results in low click and conversion rates then you are basically shooting yourself in the foot.

If you are using a CPI/CPA model for online advertising then reducing the chances of clicks and conversions is going to reduce your monetization levels.

To get past this problem you need to do what you can to obtain ad diversity with your mobile app ads so as to not create ad blindness with your users:

• Choose ad networks carefully – look to diversify your ad partners so that your ad networks aren’t using the same types of ads.
• Consider blacklists – many ad networks support blacklists so you can block certain advertisers which will then allow you to not only block inappropriate ads and competitor ads but also to skip ads that are being shown too often.
• Test and review – make sure part of your marketing process is to regularly use the apps to see what the user sees which will help you understand when ad blindness might be taking place due to a lack of diversity.

The bottom line is that if you rely or use a CPI/CPA model for online advertising then every click and conversion from an ad matters. You don’t want your mobile gaming users suffering from ad blindness because it reflects a bad user experience while also limiting the revenue you could be generating from a more diverse set of ads.

Be sure to check back every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for great new Lounge Lizard blog articles.