This post was most recently updated on October 24th, 2023
Do you get fed up while scrolling through a website & accidentally click an ad that leads you totally astray?
This can affect your ad revenue plus your readers find it extremely frustrating.
Have you ever experienced abnormally high click-through rates on some ads?
This happens when a reader accidentally clicks on an ad while he or she visited your site just for the content.
Your advertisers may turn down or stop bidding on your ad units in case of too many accidental ad clicks. (CRITICAL!)
Your readers came to your site for a reason (not just to click an ad unintentionally).
As a publisher, why should you care?
Well, if most of the clicks coming from your pages are invalid, your ad account gets disabled (This is done to protect advertisers).
This blog post discusses what you can do to avoid accidental clicks and protect your ad revenue.
Pop-up close buttons overlapping your ads?
Reviewing all the pop-ups on your website is a must.
Pop-ups are like seasoning to a recipe – too much, and you’ll overwhelm your site.
However, the right pinch can engage your audience and help build your mailing list & newsletter subscriptions.
Your pop-ups and ads need to work coherently in an effective manner.
We often see accidental clicks when readers attempt to close a pop-up window but inadvertently click an ad instead as the close button was overlapping the ad.
-Move these pop-ups to another area on your website
-Ensure that the close button is big enough
-Try shifting the close button to the side of your pop-up i.e opposite to the sidebar of your website.
-The close button needs to be completely inside the pop-up box.
Ever taken a closer look at the top of your site?
A drop-down navigation bar is a smooth way for your readers to easily scroll across your website.
But how does it cause unintentional clicks?
The drop-down menu can cover your top sidebar or header ad unit (Yikes!)
Make sure that the drop-down area helps your readers get what they were looking for while shielding those ads from accidental clicks.
Check the header or top sidebar ad by clicking or hovering over the navigation bar to expand the drop-down menu.
Now, head to the bottom of your site and check out your sticky footer ad area.
The footer area is one of the most viewed and high-valued ad units on your website.
You need to make sure nothing gets in the way of the footer ad’s earning potential!
The ad may be unintentionally clicked by readers trying to interact with other elements in your footer.
The “Back to top” button and social media share buttons can also clog up that space on your site, especially in mobile screen mode.
Get a free consultation with us if you are facing trouble following these steps.
Also, see if your site has any sticky or floating elements, such as social media sticky buttons or any notifications that may be sliding in over ads.
Despite the fact that they may be effective at driving traffic to the desired destination, you have to be careful about accidental clicks if they end up covering ads.
You need to be careful about the way you place ads that are too close to tappable page elements or navigational controls.
Avoiding implementations that lead to invalid click activity is in the best interest of publishers.
Let’s take a look at flash game sites for instance.
As you play games on these sites, take note that ads are often placed very close to the Flash players where these games are played.
Publishers may believe that by placing their ads near the areas where their users are most active, they are providing maximum value to advertisers.
These Flash games require users to do a lot of mouse movements and clicks since they’re often played with a mouse.
We have seen many instances in which ads were placed too close to the call to action, causing many accidental clicks.
Every game and site is different, so we can’t provide publishers with an exact distance between ads and games.
A minimum distance of 150 px between the ads & the flash player is ideal.
You will notice in the long term that increasing the minimum distance between ads and the flash player can boost your cost per clicks.
The revenue you receive on each click on an advertiser’s ad depends on the amount the advertiser pays.
By moving the ads farther away from Flash games, the likelihood of unintentional clicks will be reduced resulting in genuine and intentional clicks only resulting in legit conversions (Advertisers will love you for this).
A win-win situation for all stakeholders indeed!
Fast clicks are neither real nor profitable clicks. It’s practically impossible for a site visitor to read, understand, and take action on an ad the moment they view it.
Not surprisingly, we found super-fast clicks on ads to provide little to no value to advertisers.
Fast clicks on ads barely provide any value to advertisers. That’s why fast clicks are not included in metrics because they are detected as unintentional clicks instantly upon the ad load.
The main goal is to provide an uninterrupted mobile user experience here.
Fat fingers and touchscreens don’t go hand in hand: the average fingerpad is about 50 pixels wide when pressed down.
With all the touching, swiping, and pinching we do on our screens, it’s easy for us to touch the edge of an ad that pops up out of nowhere or is super close to tappable controls.
Clicks coming from the edge of ads usually produce higher conversion rates with higher intentions than those coming from the interior regions.
MonetizeMore can help you expand the protections across mobile placements leading to NO BS intentional ad clicks. Click here to learn more!
Fast clicks and edge clicks are just two of the user interaction issues that can be avoided in the mobile mode so that advertisers’ money doesn’t run down the drain.
The expansion of these protections to native ad formats on mobile mode can possibly increase conversion rates by over 10-15% with minimal impact on long-term publisher ad revenue.
Users are likely to be frustrated if they click on ads that is in their face and get redirected to another site that they never wished to visit.
The amount the advertiser pays varies from advertisement to advertisement and website to website, according to the likelihood that these clicks will be resulting in an online conversion for the advertiser.
Accidental clicks never lead to sales for an advertiser (for instance: a lead or online conversion). The price for that ad space and clicks is ultimately reduced (quantity < quality).
We hope that our suggestions to avoid accidental clicks will help you keep your content fresh and clean. Nobody wants to piss off advertisers with unsolicited clicks indirectly burning ad revenue money.
Tens of millions of accidental clicks per day are prevented by our protections across the web and mobile apps, saving publishers, users, and advertisers time & money.
With over seven years at the forefront of programmatic advertising, Aleesha is a renowned Ad-Tech expert, blending innovative strategies with cutting-edge technology. Her insights have reshaped programmatic advertising, leading to groundbreaking campaigns and 10X ROI increases for publishers and global brands. She believes in setting new standards in dynamic ad targeting and optimization.
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