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Google Begins Testing Display Ads in Gmail - The Atlantic

30 points by bound008 16y ago

Smerity 16y ago
I'd love to see the effect that these ads have on the users of Gmail, both from Google's statistical end and also from a customer sentiment angle. Gmail has touted the clean and simple feel as one of their main features for so long that users may come to expect that of Gmail now. Understandably Google has the right to show these ads considering it's a free service but will their users see it the same way? Could this open the field back up for new email competitors?
- JacobAldridge 16y ago
  On a personal note (and I'm not seeing them at this stage - just checked a few emails), the graphic ad per se won't bother me. I use Gmail personally, in basically the same headspace I use Facebook - I doubt Gmail ads will phase me if they become as graphical and ubiquitous as Facebook ads, and frankly they'll get just as many click-throughs from me (read: zero). What does concern me is the point you raise about the fact that Gmail "touted the clean and simple feel as one of their main features". In a world of garishly fugly html emails, my inbox is rarely clean and simple, but Google changing their position on this does create a market opportunity. And not everyone will feel as non-impacted as I do. I also agree with you that Google has the right to do this in their own free service - if they want to, they can go for it, and if that creates a competitor, I look forward to another webmail battle.
- axod 16y ago
  * User numbers will continue to grow * CTR for ads will jump up * Revenue will jump up * This'll be old news by next week and no one will care anymore about the change WD Google.
windsurfer 16y ago
I wonder how many people would pay 3 dollars a month for a clean, usable webmail interface for their domain.
- bowmande 16y ago
  Some would, but most people would continue to use a free service. It would have to seriously be causing the average user a pain to have them switch. More likely would be another free service that could be the gmail of years past and they would slowly become what gmail is today.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- hellrich 16y ago
  Not many, AdBlock is free. Could be a nice product if enough webmail interface providers would be able/willig to work around AdBlock.
- blub 16y ago
  I have already moved the bulk of my e-mail from gmail to my own domain. I was expecting something like this from Google - once an advertiser, always an advertiser.
- e1ven 16y ago
  There are quite a few for-pay email providers that do a great job. My favorite is Fastmail.fm, which was bought by Opera last year.
- msy 16y ago
  That's exactly what I pay Rackspace Email for. My email is my most important communication medium, it's also the nexus and backup access mechanism for most of my online accounts via password reset. You'd have to be mad to leave something so important to a free service with no SLA and no customer service where you account could disappear overnight without recourse.
- lucasr 16y ago
  Zenbe Mail was exactly that: a paid webmail service with great and clean design for $3-10 dollars a month. But they closed the service after the engineers joined Facebook as part of a talent acquisition. Not sure how successful they service was in terms of revenue/subscriptions though.
jacquesm 16y ago
Bait and switch. At least it took a few years. This is typical, I remember when gmail was rolled out and the lack of display advertising was touted as one of the big advantages over competitors (the others were a very large amount of storage and a really effective spam filter). Let's see if the competition uses this as a way to get an edge over google.
- axod 16y ago
  Yeah damn them for giving the world an awesome free email service and then having the audacity to try and make some revenue from advertising. They should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves. Scratch that, they should be done for fraud. I want my money back!!! Oh wait...
  - jacquesm 16y ago
    Right. When you launch a service and point at the competition and say 'look, no display ads, come join us' then you will be reminded of that when you change tack later. That does not diminish the quality of the actual service and does not diminish the right of google to try to make as much revenue as they can. It's just a good reminder that corporate promises amount to very little.
    - axod 16y ago
      Can you cite a reference there? I never heard GMail being touted as "Like the competition, but no display ads". I was a fairly early user, and never heard it talked of like that. Infact I remember the opposite - they got quite a lot of flack basing the advertising on the content of your emails. Some references to these "promises" would be cool also. Personally, I don't use GMail because it doesn't have display ads, I don't care about advertising, sometimes it's useful, sometimes not. I like seeing it, because often it is useful. I use GMail because it's a fantastic email client. Search is instant, features other email clients only dream of. etc etc. A display ad doesn't take away from that. There's a line of acceptability with advertising. Display ads is still extremely tame and non intrusive. When they start doing popups, popunders, video ads with sound, the underlining of keywords with popup contextual ads, etc... then I'd be up in arms too.
motters 16y ago
I only really use gmail as a spam filter anyway, forwarding mail to another account, so I avoid seeing any banner ads or other nonsense. My advice to any Google people who might be reading is to keep gmail as clean looking as possible, and avoid image based ads (especially animated ones).
plinkplonk 16y ago
(imo) Just another sign that Google, like any other big company, is being overrun by incompetent PowerPoint slinging managers with stupid ideas, optimizing for short term results. Or maybe they are just running out of ideas as the company bloats and ages. See the catch-up-to-bing-with-junk-UI-redesign efforts for example. If this is a success then one more small step and we'll get image ads for search. The same justifications(and PowerPoint Decks) can be reused with minor tweaks. This does seem like bait and switch, as jacquesm points out. Sad, but IMAP + Adblock should be enough as a short term fix I guess. I haven't yet used AdBlock on Google ads because they are largely unobtrusive text ads, but if this junk starts showing up in my Inbox I will. Longer term Google needs some decent competition, especially in the search space. Too dominant a position in any market is fertilizer for hubris.
- awakeasleep 16y ago
  I have not been able to block google text ads with adblock despite15 minutes of peering at the page source.
  - pavel_lishin 16y ago
    I don't see any ads yet - I guess they haven't rolled them out? Can you show me a screenshot?
- bioh42_2 16y ago
  What pushed me into using Adblock is that every so often adds turn out to be security problems. Sure, it is rare and fixed quickly but if they show up in my gmail account, which I use for authentication, I will start looking for another email service. Anyone know of a great, secure and add free email service?
  - pasbesoin 16y ago
    This is a good point. If and as they proceed, they'd better run more than the usual level of due diligence to insure they don't become a vector for something nasty. Google properties are some of the few I let through without a lot of filtering (Gmail in particular). If it looks like they are becoming a vector, this will lessen their utility for me and I will tighten the hatches on them. (Of course, I suppose this factor won't apply for 99% of their users. We may be the outliers having no statistical significance. At least, until something big enough and bad enough slips through.) I have mixed feelings about blocking advertising that provides supporting revenue, but two factors override: Motion (and occasionally, sound), that completely and thoroughly distracts me from the page content and which, over prolonged exposure, leaves me "frazzled" and ineffective; and malware. (Also, when graphics are overwhelmingly "bright" compared to the content, I need to dial them down.) Nothing that hasn't been said a thousand times before, I suppose.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
sdrinf 16y ago
Remember, folks: A/B testing a feature does not equal large-scale deployment. The question isn't whether this move is right, or wrong, but rather, is a statistically significant proportion of the target demographic going to click through to justify the PR loss?
- axod 16y ago
  Yes. The CTR and revenue for image ads is way above text ads. This is a good move. By "PR loss" I assume you mean "geeks moan for an hour or 2 on hacker news" ;)
sp332 16y ago
1. Install an email client of your choice: Outlook, Evolution, Thunderbird, etc. 2. Enable IMAP access in GMail settings https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&shva=1#settings/fwdandpop https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&shva=1#settings/fwdan... 3. Configure your client https://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=75726 https://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=75726 Done, now I can check my email without ads! I can even (depending on client & configuration) search emails with my platform search tool: Spotlight, Windows Search, etc.
shrikant 16y ago
From http://searchengineland.com/google-testing-display-ads-in-gmail-62623 http://searchengineland.com/google-testing-display-ads-in-gm...: We're always trying out new ad formats and placements in Gmail, and we recently started experimenting with image ads on messages with heavy image content. Interesting. I wonder what 'image-heavy' is; attached images, or embedded images that get blocked anyway...
- rudiger 16y ago
  Google wants to target more (and better-converting) display advertisements on daily deal subscription emails (ie. Groupon, LivingSocial), which always feature plenty of images and style and are incredibly lucrative.
blhack 16y ago
How many of us actually access gmail via gmail.com anymore? It's an exchange account on my phone, which syncs all of my contacts, and my calendar, and an IMAP account on my desktops. The only time I ever actually sign into gmail.com is when I need to set up a new filter (if I sign up for a new mailing list or something), or if I want to use gmail's search.
klbarry 16y ago
I think the average person minds ads much less than the average programmer/technical person. Just my personal experience. An online example would be the constant barrage against advertising on Reddit, which you don't really see in communities with different demographics.

30 points by bound008 16y ago

I'd love to see the effect that these ads have on the users of Gmail, both from Google's statistical end and also from a customer sentiment angle. Gmail has touted the clean and simple feel as one of their main features for so long that users may come to expect that of Gmail now. Understandably Google has the right to show these ads considering it's a free service but will their users see it the same way? Could this open the field back up for new email competitors?

JacobAldridge 16y ago
On a personal note (and I'm not seeing them at this stage - just checked a few emails), the graphic ad per se won't bother me. I use Gmail personally, in basically the same headspace I use Facebook - I doubt Gmail ads will phase me if they become as graphical and ubiquitous as Facebook ads, and frankly they'll get just as many click-throughs from me (read: zero). What does concern me is the point you raise about the fact that Gmail "touted the clean and simple feel as one of their main features". In a world of garishly fugly html emails, my inbox is rarely clean and simple, but Google changing their position on this does create a market opportunity. And not everyone will feel as non-impacted as I do. I also agree with you that Google has the right to do this in their own free service - if they want to, they can go for it, and if that creates a competitor, I look forward to another webmail battle.
axod 16y ago
* User numbers will continue to grow * CTR for ads will jump up * Revenue will jump up * This'll be old news by next week and no one will care anymore about the change WD Google.

windsurfer 16y ago

I wonder how many people would pay 3 dollars a month for a clean, usable webmail interface for their domain.

bowmande 16y ago
Some would, but most people would continue to use a free service. It would have to seriously be causing the average user a pain to have them switch. More likely would be another free service that could be the gmail of years past and they would slowly become what gmail is today.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
hellrich 16y ago
Not many, AdBlock is free. Could be a nice product if enough webmail interface providers would be able/willig to work around AdBlock.
blub 16y ago
I have already moved the bulk of my e-mail from gmail to my own domain. I was expecting something like this from Google - once an advertiser, always an advertiser.
e1ven 16y ago
There are quite a few for-pay email providers that do a great job. My favorite is Fastmail.fm, which was bought by Opera last year.
msy 16y ago
That's exactly what I pay Rackspace Email for. My email is my most important communication medium, it's also the nexus and backup access mechanism for most of my online accounts via password reset. You'd have to be mad to leave something so important to a free service with no SLA and no customer service where you account could disappear overnight without recourse.
lucasr 16y ago
Zenbe Mail was exactly that: a paid webmail service with great and clean design for $3-10 dollars a month. But they closed the service after the engineers joined Facebook as part of a talent acquisition. Not sure how successful they service was in terms of revenue/subscriptions though.

jacquesm 16y ago

Bait and switch. At least it took a few years. This is typical, I remember when gmail was rolled out and the lack of display advertising was touted as one of the big advantages over competitors (the others were a very large amount of storage and a really effective spam filter). Let's see if the competition uses this as a way to get an edge over google.

axod 16y ago
Yeah damn them for giving the world an awesome free email service and then having the audacity to try and make some revenue from advertising. They should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves. Scratch that, they should be done for fraud. I want my money back!!! Oh wait...
- jacquesm 16y ago
  Right. When you launch a service and point at the competition and say 'look, no display ads, come join us' then you will be reminded of that when you change tack later. That does not diminish the quality of the actual service and does not diminish the right of google to try to make as much revenue as they can. It's just a good reminder that corporate promises amount to very little.
  - axod 16y ago
    Can you cite a reference there? I never heard GMail being touted as "Like the competition, but no display ads". I was a fairly early user, and never heard it talked of like that. Infact I remember the opposite - they got quite a lot of flack basing the advertising on the content of your emails. Some references to these "promises" would be cool also. Personally, I don't use GMail because it doesn't have display ads, I don't care about advertising, sometimes it's useful, sometimes not. I like seeing it, because often it is useful. I use GMail because it's a fantastic email client. Search is instant, features other email clients only dream of. etc etc. A display ad doesn't take away from that. There's a line of acceptability with advertising. Display ads is still extremely tame and non intrusive. When they start doing popups, popunders, video ads with sound, the underlining of keywords with popup contextual ads, etc... then I'd be up in arms too.

motters 16y ago

I only really use gmail as a spam filter anyway, forwarding mail to another account, so I avoid seeing any banner ads or other nonsense. My advice to any Google people who might be reading is to keep gmail as clean looking as possible, and avoid image based ads (especially animated ones).

plinkplonk 16y ago

(imo) Just another sign that Google, like any other big company, is being overrun by incompetent PowerPoint slinging managers with stupid ideas, optimizing for short term results. Or maybe they are just running out of ideas as the company bloats and ages. See the catch-up-to-bing-with-junk-UI-redesign efforts for example. If this is a success then one more small step and we'll get image ads for search. The same justifications(and PowerPoint Decks) can be reused with minor tweaks. This does seem like bait and switch, as jacquesm points out. Sad, but IMAP + Adblock should be enough as a short term fix I guess. I haven't yet used AdBlock on Google ads because they are largely unobtrusive text ads, but if this junk starts showing up in my Inbox I will. Longer term Google needs some decent competition, especially in the search space. Too dominant a position in any market is fertilizer for hubris.

awakeasleep 16y ago
I have not been able to block google text ads with adblock despite15 minutes of peering at the page source.
- pavel_lishin 16y ago
  I don't see any ads yet - I guess they haven't rolled them out? Can you show me a screenshot?
bioh42_2 16y ago
What pushed me into using Adblock is that every so often adds turn out to be security problems. Sure, it is rare and fixed quickly but if they show up in my gmail account, which I use for authentication, I will start looking for another email service. Anyone know of a great, secure and add free email service?
- pasbesoin 16y ago
  This is a good point. If and as they proceed, they'd better run more than the usual level of due diligence to insure they don't become a vector for something nasty. Google properties are some of the few I let through without a lot of filtering (Gmail in particular). If it looks like they are becoming a vector, this will lessen their utility for me and I will tighten the hatches on them. (Of course, I suppose this factor won't apply for 99% of their users. We may be the outliers having no statistical significance. At least, until something big enough and bad enough slips through.) I have mixed feelings about blocking advertising that provides supporting revenue, but two factors override: Motion (and occasionally, sound), that completely and thoroughly distracts me from the page content and which, over prolonged exposure, leaves me "frazzled" and ineffective; and malware. (Also, when graphics are overwhelmingly "bright" compared to the content, I need to dial them down.) Nothing that hasn't been said a thousand times before, I suppose.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

sdrinf 16y ago

Remember, folks: A/B testing a feature does not equal large-scale deployment. The question isn't whether this move is right, or wrong, but rather, is a statistically significant proportion of the target demographic going to click through to justify the PR loss?

axod 16y ago
Yes. The CTR and revenue for image ads is way above text ads. This is a good move. By "PR loss" I assume you mean "geeks moan for an hour or 2 on hacker news" ;)

sp332 16y ago

1. Install an email client of your choice: Outlook, Evolution, Thunderbird, etc. 2. Enable IMAP access in GMail settings https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&shva=1#settings/fwdandpop https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&shva=1#settings/fwdan... 3. Configure your client https://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=75726 https://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=75726 Done, now I can check my email without ads! I can even (depending on client & configuration) search emails with my platform search tool: Spotlight, Windows Search, etc.

shrikant 16y ago

From http://searchengineland.com/google-testing-display-ads-in-gmail-62623 http://searchengineland.com/google-testing-display-ads-in-gm...: We're always trying out new ad formats and placements in Gmail, and we recently started experimenting with image ads on messages with heavy image content. Interesting. I wonder what 'image-heavy' is; attached images, or embedded images that get blocked anyway...

rudiger 16y ago
Google wants to target more (and better-converting) display advertisements on daily deal subscription emails (ie. Groupon, LivingSocial), which always feature plenty of images and style and are incredibly lucrative.

blhack 16y ago

How many of us actually access gmail via gmail.com anymore? It's an exchange account on my phone, which syncs all of my contacts, and my calendar, and an IMAP account on my desktops. The only time I ever actually sign into gmail.com is when I need to set up a new filter (if I sign up for a new mailing list or something), or if I want to use gmail's search.

klbarry 16y ago

I think the average person minds ads much less than the average programmer/technical person. Just my personal experience. An online example would be the constant barrage against advertising on Reddit, which you don't really see in communities with different demographics.