Adverts in posts

[Edwin_m]

7 minutes ago, Dungrange said:

 

I don't think the advert choice is that specific.  If you visit a few websites looking for a garden shed, then Google will add its 'garden' category to your profile and then when you subsequently visit a site like RMWeb, the Google ad server will look at your Google profile, detect that Google thinks you have an interest in gardening products and will show you a random advert, possibly for a garden shed or some similar product, based on the types of product you have previously looked at (and were presumably interested in at some point in time).  Since Google will only add the interest to your profile after you have considered buying something, it makes sense that you will subsequently see an advert after you have made your decision.

 

The product supplier has only bought an advertising package with Google to place their advert in front of say 100,000 visitors to various sites.  They are not going to try to ascertain whether or not you are or have been a customer for a particular product.  What Google are trying to do with the data that they hold on you is to put what are hopefully more relevant adverts on your screen (as opposed to irrelevant adverts) and from the advertisers point of view, put their advert in front of the right demographic.  For example, knowing that I am a 45-54 year old male, Google will probably choose not to show me adverts for women's sanitary products!

Often I see an ad for the exact same product I browsed, so something more specific is going on than just categorising people's interests.  Since the ad provider knows my detailed browsing history within the shopping site then it shouldn't be beyond them to include a check whether I actually bought the widget in question.  Another annoying feature with that type of targeted advertising is that I might have looked at or bought an item as a present for a relative, only to have it popping up on screen when they are sitting next to me.  

 

As I say it hasn't happened here so is I suspect and hope that what Andy is using with Google is something else.  But I'm on a different PC from usual so anything cookie-related or IP-related probably hasn't built up any history yet.  

[Edwin_m]

51 minutes ago, brushman47544 said:

 

Was there an Ad in that space and you deleted it?

 

i am certainly happy for the relevant Ads we saw in the past, but all these non-railways/modelling Ads are irritating because the page loads, you go to click and the page readjusts itself to include the Ad and you're now looking - or typing - somewhere else. In some cases at least i don't get an Ad, just a great big grey band occupying 2/3rds of the screen!

 

Hope you can resolve this satisfactorily for non-Gold members.

I'm also getting the big grey band.  When something similar happens with actual ads on other sites, I've usually scrolled down by the time it downloads.  So the ad never gets viewed.  

[gismorail]

18 hours ago, AY Mod said:

 

And how does that freedom get paid for?

I do understand that situation Andy but do they have to be so obtrusive and from a comment in your other posts I hope you can get some clarity on the situation otherwise I'm afraid it will serious affect the numbers using this forum. 

[chris p bacon]

19 hours ago, TheQ said:

, so  i occasionally get adverts from what i assume other people are looking at.. like under wear for LARGE women..

Are you lucky or unlucky if you get adverts for LARGE women, rather than just their underwear 

Edited August 24, 2019 by chris p bacon

[Enterprisingwestern]

 

I don't think it is browser based in my situation, although it may vary for others, as, being based in Spain, I get adverts in both English and Spanish in random order, and the Spanish ones are for companies I don't even know of the product/service they offer, let alone have searched for it.

 

Mike.

[Ozexpatriate]

Mid-list advertising appears to be back.

 

This is AdChoices advertising panels in addition to the panels at the top and bottom of the page.

 

They appear after the first topic item in a list of topics. Like this one.

 

I am also seeing them after the first post on the page in reply to a topic. On this page this morning.

 

I respect the need for advertising and and accept the panels at the top and bottom of the page but have to ask "are the mid-list advertising panels necessary?" Does RMweb see more income with these additional panels?

 

Two panels per page was plenty. The third panel per page is irritating and leading to unintentional clicks. (While I'm happy for accidental clicks to represent incremental revenues to RMweb it leads to random spawn on every web page I look at.)

[AY Mod]

4 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

Does RMweb see more income with these additional panels?

 

In a word, yes.

 

It's an evaluation test at the moment.

[Ozexpatriate]

3 minutes ago, AY Mod said:

In a word, yes.

 

It's an evaluation test at the moment.

Thanks for the clarification Andy.

 

I'm in favour of more revenue for RMweb, but this one is irritating. If they were static, that would be one thing but flashing ads in the middle of topics or lists is over the top (in my opinion).

 

Is is possible to control advertising to be non-animated?

[AY Mod]

2 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

 

Is is possible to control advertising to be non-animated?

 

As they are Google Ads we don't control them. We'll evaluate reaction Vs revenue but I'll be honest and say I've disabled their appearance for Gold users.

[Ozexpatriate]

1 minute ago, AY Mod said:

I've disabled their appearance for Gold users

That's fair. It is worth highlighting that as a feature of Gold membership.

[SHMD]

All my adverts are coming up in German at the mo!  -  Ok, I am in Berlin...

 

Strangely enough, not a single advert on this page of the thread as I type.

 

 

Kev

[Georgeconna]

Victories Secrets are coming up for me!! Had to pleasure of 'accidentally' clicking in the other day. Top Quality sweatshop fashion.

[Steamport Southport]

Victoria Secret and Paco Rabbane. And Damensein which I believe is German women's wear.

 

Seems like adverts aimed at the wrong sort of models...

 

 

 

Jason

[Colin_McLeod]

KR Models perhaps lol 

 

https://images.app.goo.gl/edkaU4n73ypjsJXC7

[Georgeconna]

Good one Colin. I Already have one woman, Can't afford another plus there are laws to protect us from having more than one wife thankfully! a GT3 is most definately a Cheaper Alternative!

 

Edited November 25, 2019 by Georgeconna

[John M Upton]

I insist on adblocker on all my devices and I am getting blank spaces where the adverts would be which is a tad annoying.

[BlueLightning]

6 minutes ago, John M Upton said:

I insist on adblocker on all my devices and I am getting blank spaces where the adverts would be which is a tad annoying.

 

An easy problem to fix, no blank spaces here with RMWeb whitelisted in my adblocker, and it helps pay for the unbelievably useful resource that is RMWeb

[Reorte]

27 minutes ago, BlueLightning said:

 

An easy problem to fix, no blank spaces here with RMWeb whitelisted in my adblocker, and it helps pay for the unbelievably useful resource that is RMWeb

 

Adverts between posts aren't an improvement on blank spaces though. I whitelisted RMWeb a while back - on the model ads front there's always a chance I'll see something that catches my attention and interest, so that works for everyone, but I find ads between posts is definitely getting into irritating territory, as are animated ones. There's a reason adblockers became popular in the first place...

[AY Mod]

11 minutes ago, Reorte said:

I find ads between posts is definitely getting into irritating territory, as are animated ones. 

 

Look deep into your soul.

 

18 hours ago, AY Mod said:

I'll be honest and say I've disabled their appearance for Gold users.

 

[BlueLightning]

33 minutes ago, Reorte said:

 

Adverts between posts aren't an improvement on blank spaces though. I whitelisted RMWeb a while back - on the model ads front there's always a chance I'll see something that catches my attention and interest, so that works for everyone, but I find ads between posts is definitely getting into irritating territory, as are animated ones. There's a reason adblockers became popular in the first place...

 

It was a tongue in cheek response to the "problem" of white space caused by an adblocker, pointing out that the ads are there to help pay for the resource we are all able to use for free.

 

An actual fix would be to sign up for Gold membership as Andy has already said that those ads are gone for those members.

 

Alternatively Warners could decide that carrying on losing money keeping RMWeb alive is no longer worth it and pull the plug. The white spaces would go away then. I'd rather have the adverts until I can afford to spend the money on Gold though.

 

Gary

Edited November 26, 2019 by BlueLightning

[Reorte]

Please note that I've said that I don't have a fundamental objection to ads on RMWeb, and it's one of the very, very few sites that I've whitelisted. And whilst Gold membership is a perfectly decent thing to offer I think it's also fair to consider that if advertising starts getting intrusive it may ultimately be counter-productive (adverts that is, not Gold membership).

 

I do wonder if adverts work if people pay to avoid them though. Sure, they may work for the site in question but are they working for the advertiser, in which case why is the advertiser paying? Is an ad that irritates going to help or hinder the advertiser?

 

Gold membership aside, I don't see that it has to be a choice between adverts that actively annoy and the site not being viable. Get the adverts right and they can even be part of the pull I reckon, with paper magazines (on a dedicated subject rather than, say, Sunday supplements) I'll often browse the adverts as well as the articles, and they generally don't get in each others' way. Websites don't seem to have been able to reproduce that very well though.

Edited November 26, 2019 by Reorte

[BlueLightning]

I can see you have not stated an objection to the ads in general. I just wanted to clarify my post, and what the actual alternatives are. I agree animated ads can be a bit much, but these are not controlled by RMWeb, and are based on browsing history (Unless you disable that with google) So far I have only seen ads that are of interest to me.

 

Once upon a time I used to run a forum much smaller than RMWeb, and that was headache enough. People in these sorts of threads seem to not realise how much effort it is, and give Andy a much harder time than is fair. Especially when their gripe is something do do with blocking adverts that are there to help pay the running costs, or things that are out of his hands, and he has already said are out of his hands / being looked into. (both of which have been stated)

 

For anyone that doesn't know you can report ads to google as being overly intrusive by clicking the X in the corner of the advert.

 

Gary

[Reorte]

Incidentally sometimes I just get a bit of a gap and no advert.

 

[Steamport Southport]

 

9 hours ago, BlueLightning said:

I can see you have not stated an objection to the ads in general. I just wanted to clarify my post, and what the actual alternatives are. I agree animated ads can be a bit much, but these are not controlled by RMWeb, and are based on browsing history (Unless you disable that with google) So far I have only seen ads that are of interest to me.

 

Not always. Most of the ones I've seen have nothing at all to do with my browsing history. Considering I've spent most of the evening trying to find a hotel in Yorkshire then I would expect loads of hotel or travel adverts.

 

I've certainly not been looking for clothes, ladies shoes, gyms, dating, perfume, etc. YMMV.    

 

 

To be fair as long as it's not like the average local newspaper website with pop ups everywhere, I can live with a few adverts.

 

 

 

Jason

[Sol]

I have no problems with ads as long as they relate to the forum - that is in the main.... Model Rail

 

If I want to look for other items that bear no resemblance to this obby, then i will search using Google or Bing or whatever !!