Banner Ad Statistics

Sun Feb 06, 2005 4:13 am

I don't know if or when anyone on PPT has run some statistics on the banner ads, but because I was bored and playing neoquest, I informally jotted down if the banner was neopets based or from outside the site.

I ran the test for 200 refreshes and found that of that number only 31 of those were neopets adds. The remaining 169 were for off-site.

I honestly don't know how to react to this. Does it suprise me? No far from it. I think I'm disappointed though.

I'll continue if you think it is worthwhile. I have nothing better to do when playing neoquest...

Sun Feb 06, 2005 4:26 am

Please do! The larger the population sample the more accurate the results. Size does matter!

Sun Feb 06, 2005 4:28 am

I'd be curious to know what age account you're on, and whether there's a difference between them. As long as you have nothing better to do.

Sun Feb 06, 2005 4:30 am

Katy wrote:I'd be curious to know what age account you're on, and whether there's a difference between them. As long as you have nothing better to do.

I dont there is. Seeing how its in an ad rotator. Its not based on age.

Sun Feb 06, 2005 4:30 am

I can only assume I'm on the adult account setting because I'm 20 years old and I was truthful when registering my account.

Edit:
So I have another batch before going to bed. This time I refreshed 300 times and saw 42 Neopets ads. Two of which were questionable because they were ads for Neopets merchandise. The remaining 258 were off-site ads.

Between the two, there were 500 refreshes, 73 Neopets ads, 427 off-site ads.

Doing some quick-in-my-head math, that comes to 14.6% Neopets ads, and 85.6% off-site.

Sun Feb 06, 2005 5:12 am

hyperflutterby wrote:Doing some quick-in-my-head math, that comes to 14.6% Neopets ads, and 85.6% off-site.

I have gotten about the same results. I use Pest Patrol to figure it out--it breaks down each cookie I get by name and number of times it has been hit. So, I compare the number of hits to Neopets.com with the number of non-Neopets sites shown.

And, gee, I seem to recall Adam saying we wouldn't get more than 3 percent off-site ads.

Website · Sun Feb 06, 2005 5:23 am

Morningstar wrote:And, gee, I seem to recall Adam saying we wouldn't get more than 3 percent off-site ads.

Exactly! This shows that they cannot be trusted. 3% indeed!

Sun Feb 06, 2005 5:32 am

Qanda wrote:
Morningstar wrote:And, gee, I seem to recall Adam saying we wouldn't get more than 3 percent off-site ads.

Exactly! This shows that they cannot be trusted. 3% indeed!

Yes, some of us were so gullible and eager back then--wanting to be beta testers for the new sidebar/banner ad extravaganza. Pick me! Pick me! And giving him such useful feedback on his new idea when he (or someone with authority) knew darned well it would be more than 3 percent.

Geez, I wonder what would have happened if he had said he had a bridge for sale.

Website · Sun Feb 06, 2005 5:45 am

I believe that Adam took back that statement after he talked about the new toolbar because of the new banners... Don't quote me on it though. I think thats what he said..

Sun Feb 06, 2005 7:19 am

the last number I recall was 10% outside ads, the rest would be neo-related. There's a chance I missed something though ... I usually do

Sun Feb 06, 2005 8:59 am

I can only remember him ever saying that outside ads would be 3%, I could put up with 10% maybe even 20% of outside ads but 80+%? Im sorry Adam but that is just bordering on ridiculous.

Ive sent in numerous complaints about some of the ads that bring my computer to a standstill and nothing has been done about them. Personally I wouldnt mind having no new content on the site for a week if thats what it took to sort the banners out, get rid of any that are not family friendly and sort it out so we only see them occasionally.

Sun Feb 06, 2005 9:10 am

xjox wrote:Ive sent in numerous complaints about some of the ads that bring my computer to a standstill and nothing has been done about them.

I've noticed this as well. The "ad server" doesn't seem to be located at neopets.com ... and it always needs to load something from some other server (I've noticed a couple of different names in the bottom as it tries to load ... hunt7.com? and some other one with "ad" in it).

Anyway, my browser is constantly getting stuck waiting on getting the dumb ad to load. It always helps to just try refreshing the screen a few times until I get a banner ad that loads quickly.

I know ... people keep saying there are "work arounds" to get rid of the ads. I haven't done that.

The worst thing about the ads is the location, I think.

I hate that it is so close to the tab bar in Netscape ... I am always clicking on new tabs ... but accidently hitting the silly ad and opening another window. I suppose they were planned that way, though.

Sun Feb 06, 2005 11:42 am

dlfreak wrote:Please do! The larger the population sample the more accurate the results. Size does matter!

Size doesn't matter. It's how you use it. For example... if you have 1,000 samples but printed that out of 100% machine washable paper and then proceeded to eat the paper... then it wouldn't matter at all.

Sun Feb 06, 2005 12:04 pm

Wow. I think thats outrageous number. Adam DID say 3%, I don't believe he said 83%. This is outrageous, if Neo dosen't let you link offsite, then why can we have offsite banners?

Website · Sun Feb 06, 2005 2:07 pm

Before the attack of the banner ads, all the ads in the toolbar were somehow related to neopets.
Neopets has "promised not to put pop up ads" and the banner ads are the way of avoiding pop ups. I think that banner ads are worst than pop ups. It's not like you can just get rid of the ad or use a banner ad blocker.