Most hated advertising

Jakob Nielsen summarizes research on user's perceptions of online advertising and which advertising practices (popups, playing sound, blinking) are most annoying.

Jakob ends with some "Lessons for Websites":

Sites that accept advertising should think twice before accepting ads that 80 to 90% of users strongly dislike. The resulting drop in customer satisfaction will damage your long-term prospects.

Advertisers themselves might be tempted to continue with these nasty design techniques as long as they can find sites that will run them. After all, they typically yield higher clickthrough rates. But clickthrough is not the only goal. Users who are deceived into clicking on a misleading ad might drive up your CTR, but they're unlikely to convert into paying customers. And your brand suffers a distinct negative impact when you antagonize customers.

See also my earlier post, "Bringing sense to web advertising".

[via Alex Edelman]

Update: Jeff Boulter slams Yahoo for their annoying advertising.