How does the adoption of ad blockers affect news consumption?
- Ad blockers allow users to browse websites without viewing ads. Online news publishers that rely on advertising income tend to perceive users’ adoption of ad blockers purely as a threat to revenue. Yet, this perception ignores the possibility that avoiding ads—which users presumably dislike—may affect users’ online news consumption behavior in positive ways. Using 3.1 million visits from 79,856 registered users on a news website, this research finds that ad blocker adoption has robust positive effects on the quantity and variety of articles users consume. Specifically, ad blocker adoption increases the number of articles that users read by 21.0%–43.2%, and it increases the number of content categories that users consume by 13.4%–29.1%. These effects are stronger for less-experienced users of the website. The increase in news consumption stems from increases in repeat visits to the news website, rather than in the number of page impressions per visit. These postadoption visits tend to start from direct navigation to the news website, rather than from referral sources. The authors discuss how news publishers could benefit from these findings, including exploring revenue models that consider users’ desire to avoid ads.
Author: | Shunyao YanORCiDGND, Klaus Matthias MillerORCiDGND, Bernd SkieraORCiDGND |
---|---|
URN: | urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-862821 |
DOI: | https://doi.org/10.1177/00222437221076160 |
ISSN: | 1547-7193 |
ISSN: | 0022-2437 |
Parent Title (English): | Journal of marketing research |
Publisher: | Sage Publishing |
Place of publication: | Thousand Oaks, CA |
Document Type: | Article |
Language: | English |
Date of Publication (online): | 2022/01/13 |
Date of first Publication: | 2022/01/13 |
Publishing Institution: | Universitätsbibliothek Johann Christian Senckenberg |
Release Date: | 2024/07/16 |
Tag: | ad blocker; monetization of content; news consumption; online advertising |
Volume: | 59 |
Issue: | 5 |
Page Number: | 17 |
First Page: | 1002 |
Last Page: | 1018 |
HeBIS-PPN: | 520873076 |
Institutes: | Wirtschaftswissenschaften / Wirtschaftswissenschaften |
Angeschlossene und kooperierende Institutionen / E-Finance Lab e.V. | |
Dewey Decimal Classification: | 3 Sozialwissenschaften / 33 Wirtschaft / 330 Wirtschaft |
Sammlungen: | Universitätspublikationen |
Licence (German): | ![]() |