Squidoography

If you visited Squidoo lately, you must have noticed the new leaderboard ads that appear at the top of every lens now. Here's an update from Megan Casey on the official SquidBlog:

Over the next 2 weeks, we’re going to run some advertising tests to see if we can reach previous levels. To start, we’re going to try a new display ad unit at the top of lenses. It will run from Sunday at midnight EST for one week. We’ll watch numbers, and if they’re considerable, we’ll work on a way to design that spot even better. If the numbers aren’t worth it, for us or for you, we’ll take the ad down. And try something else the following week.

I am glad this is just temporary because there are at least three things terribly wrong with those leaderboard ads.

1. The ads are not related to your lens content, e.g. are not targeted. At some point in the past the 300x250 Glam ad spot was replaced with a graphical Google ad. I was quite happy because those Google ads matched my lens content perfectly. Why they came back to Glam ads is beyond me (well, I guess they must make them more money, although I have know idea how they do it if the ads do not match the lens content).
2. The ads are obtrusive. I firmly believe that our content should always come first, and a few dollars higher lensrank payout does not justify potential loss of affiliate sales because our visitors get turned off by obnoxious ads. The new leaderboard ads are placed above everything, including even your lens title.
   
3. The ads are for US only (or at least for select few countries like US, Canada and possibly UK). I am from Lithuania and the only ads I ever see are for Glam advertising program itself (see screenshot here - all 3 ads lead to the same page). Lensmasters from other countries including Australia and Croatia reported the same thing. What a huge waste of ad space it is if only US visitors ever see real ads while others (over 46% of Squidoo visitors) have to see the very same ads promoting Glam advertising program over and over again. I wonder if they even make any money for non-US visitors?
   

If I have learned anything from those ads, it's that fashionable, smart and chic women all "crave" Glam Media advertising :-)

I won't even begin to complain about how the new ads mess up the look of the new themes. Thankfully, this particular trial will only last for a week. I hope Squidoo will decide not to keep ads in that spot in the end.

An easy fix is changing your lens to the "Min" style - or "unmaxing" it in other words. The layout does look outdated but at least it doesn't have the obnoxious ads. I've done this for my most visited lenses which if I'm right account for about 0.5% of total daily Squidoo traffic. Not quite enough to affect the trial results, but if more lensmasters did it it would be noticeable.