5 Sneaky Advertising Schemes

Web developers are always trying to get more visitors to their websites. While there are vast numbers of people online, there are also vast numbers of websites begging for attention. As a result, innovators and entrepreneurs are always trying to develop new ways to grab your attention.

The general perception of "pop ups" is certainly not a positive one. While greedy site owners can legally incorporate pop up windows into their site, computers infected with malware often display pop ups as well.

Advertisers that pay to have their ad appear in malware-based pop ups are fueling the development of dangerous software in return for cheap product promotion.

Anyone that receives more than 5 spam messages a day probably understands how quickly personal information goes around the internet if you're not careful with who you give it to. Information is very valuable to advertisers.

Data collection has been happening for years, but even that old information has value. Ad stalking is when users are "re-marketed" to, well after having left a service. An interesting recollection of ad stalking can be read about here.

This happens all over the internet in the form of competing ads, but now advertisers are pushing this tactic even further with their products.

A recent example of aggressive marketing was an ad along the lines of: "Still using a Nokia XXXX slide phone? Upgrade today!" being displayed on the mobile phones of Nokia slide owners.

In the past, product promotion had been a relatively transparent process, but with the rise of blogging and social media this is quickly changing. You might wonder why the author of your favorite blog is promoting that new gym kit so strongly -- it's because they're being paid to!

The exploitation of Facebook fans and Twitter followers is also becoming all too common as well. Depending on the size of a fan base, a single promoted link via a status update or tweet might be worth a small fortune.

In-text ads are particularly common on sites with very high traffic, utilizing services such as Kontera and Infolinks. In-text ads appear when the user hovers over certain terms on the page they are reading.

In-text ads look similar to normal links on a page, but when the users hovers over them an annoying ad appears based on the word the ad was linked to.

Clicks on in-text ads seem to be more commonly accidental, leaving some users confused about the site they were taken to.

There are so many ways which advertisers are reaching out to users, with more constantly being devised. Avoid giving out your personal information to untrusted websites, setup separate email accounts for personal use and online sign ups, and install a pop-up blocker to prevent sneaky advertisers from getting your click!

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