How the Internet Makes
Commercials Better
Some advertisers prefer to hold content hostage, making you sit through a commercial, want to or not. Big mistake. Force-feeding is a lousy way to win friends. The nature of the medium pretty much neutralizes force-feeding anyway, since surfers can just kill the sound and busy themselves in another window until the commercial has played out.
Most important, advertisers who don’t include a skip option miss out on a valuable opportunity to make more effective commercials. Every advertiser understands the importance of hooking viewer attention from the get-go. The skip option lets you know if you’re succeeding or should try another approach. You can learn overnight what took months and sometimes years to learn in the old TV days.
Ads do seem to be improving at winning attention. Not long ago, I opted out of ads almost robot-like, unthinking, as a matter of course. No longer. More and more, I tell my cursor, “Hold on; this one looks interesting.”
For viewers and advertisers alike, that’s a good thing.