Rumors that Google is cooking something big have been confirmed. Next year comes Google Chrome, which will automatically block any ads users find annoying, radically changing the web and media landscape. So thoroughly that you will soon be unrecognizable. The web will suddenly become extremely small. And probably with only a few Slovenian media.
Online media are largely very comparable to freebies in printed form. They live off the income they generate with broadcast online ads. And among them are also the extremely annoying ones that make us all a little nervous every now and then. But on the other hand, it is necessary to realize that on some online media this type of advertising it also represents up to 80 percent of all revenues, while advertising in 'boxes' - i.e. web banners in squares - means only a pittance. This is particularly characteristic of Slovenian media space - also and mainly due to the small size and linguistic uniqueness of the Slovenian language. Slovenian media can only survive if they use extremely annoying forms of advertising.
If we turn the story a little on its head. The media creates stories, because they earn money by playing ads, with which they pay the authors of these stories. Proof that this money is getting less and less is also a survey by viralnewschart.com, which is compared to the year 2011 perceived the undeniable fact that Slovenian online media create 37 percent fewer stories published on their portals. It is a research that is currently taking place at 287 Slovenian online media sites. It is also interesting that users respond less and less to stories published on social networks. Which means they pay less and less attention to stories with likes and other actions. Reach of Slovenian online media or rather, their importance is already drastically decreasing in the eyes of Slovenian users. Direct proof is the generation of millennials, who practically do not follow domestic online media and already live in a bilingual world of English and only then Slovenian.
But let's go back to ad blocking, from which they live Slovenian websites. Google is a company which deals with advertising, lives from it and has one of the biggest monopolies on the web, comparable only to Facebook. That is why he somehow does not enter the story alone, but in the company of the greatest. This is also why we can no longer look at this move as just a move by Google, but a move Google and Facebook and some corporate players who, due to their nature of media creation and brands, do not need 'annoying advertising'. The coalition for the "Better Ads Standard" is therefore also extremely broad and includes, in addition to Google and Facebook, the companies Procter & Gamble, Unilever, WPP's GroupM, Thomson Reuters, The Washington Post and the IAB. Credible corporate names, who live in a different reality than the Slovenian media.
How Google will decide which ads to block is very simple as he has been doing research for years in which there are more than 25,000 users marked ads that were messed up. He incorporated these findings into a filter, called an adblocker at Google, which will prevent such ads from playing. Because Google Chrome (and its mobile versions) as a browser in Slovenia is used by more than 75 percent of users this kind of blocking will mean a drastic drop in advertising revenue overnight Slovenian media, who will not be able to serve their visitors with advertisements, which in some cases bring them up to 80 percent of all revenue. Of course, we can immediately logically conclude that this type of move will be for the majority Slovenian media cut off the 'wings' that had already begun and finally grounded them and made it financially impossible for them to create content. But that's not the only problem...
We all agree that the media is the foundation of democracy, because independent media prevent dictatorshipse, because with their critical view of society, they enable social balance. Then you can have a monopoly like they have Google and facebook, means an excellent weapon for creating a dictatorship and imposing opinion on the masses with extremely simple algorithm settings that prioritize the appearance of certain content while not showing other content to users.
This is also why this type of game with the media is extremely dangerous and can already mean a path to some new world of controlled information, which can only be given by a select handful of media. And part of this strategy is certainly the centralization and monopolization of the media. Less media, easier information control.
A Google it is far from the only one with this kind of filter. He also started using something similar some time ago Facebook, which less often shows users posts from online media pages on which, on the other hand (when clicking on a link to Facebook feed) the user is greeted with ads that are annoying. Such pages saw the natural reach of their Facebook posts drop by as much as half. So that this kind of thing filtering is already occurring, although no one talks about it out loud. Also, Google has been reducing the appearance of such pages in search results for a long time. And it does so quietly and without warning, as many point out experts in SEO optimization. By public announcement Google and his filter all together it just manifests into a certain fact.
'Filtering' or blocking will have the least impact on American media websites or English-language pages. They have been adapting the business model online for a long time, since in the US there has been no leasing of advertisements through media agencies for a long time and it is Google Adwords/Adsense in fact, the only (and almost monopoly) revenue business model of media in the tail and in the 'golden' middle. This is also why this type of media lives on sponsorships and affiliate programs through which they also create up to 70 percent of all revenues. In recent years, this has been joined by content marketing, which is already a good source of income for such sites. Due to the use of the English language, the growth potential of such media sites is practically unlimited. Business model Google ads is still acceptable due to the incomparably higher reach of such websites. Meanwhile, in Slovenia the media live in a completely different media reality. Slovene as a language allows for such a small reach that there cannot be a medium that would be able to fully function commercially only by broadcasting non-aggressive forms of advertisements. With the exception of those media that have behind them another media method, such as for example television, which covers the loss that occurs within online media departments.
Google prediction is an official warning to the media to prepare, because next year everything will be different. Thus, they invite the media to use the website testing tool "Webmastertools" check their website or the advertising methods they use separately developed tools for website test. And they should take action today against advertising methods that Google will no longer allow it in the future.
Sources:
theverge.com
adage.com
Due to the number of Facebook and Google mentions, this story will not have the chance to get the usual exposure on Facebook feed, because the algorithm will automatically limit its range. If you happen to catch it, share it on your wall!