Numb to the message

Tony Featherstone
August 14, 2013
The Age

Paying sky-high prices and fees for products and services is no longer enough: consumers increasingly have to put up with a barrage of advertisements before their purchase is complete.

You can’t use a new-style ATM at a convenience store without having to skip over several ads for in-store product offers. Or try buying footy tickets online without having an ad from a “network partner” thrust at you. I skipped at least six such ads during a recent purchase.

I can’t help think all this advertising at every turn is further blurring the message, numbing consumers and wasting money for businesses that use such channels.

Heaven help consumers who sign up to department or discount store promotions without reading the fine print: it feels like an email ad-a-thon at times.

It’s not just a barrage of internet ads. Watching commercial TV means putting up with insufferably large watermark ads on the TV screen that promote the station and even upcoming shows, to the point where the promo covers too much of the screen. Paying $20 to go to the movies means putting up with seemingly endless ads at the start.

Even worse are live sport broadcasts that numb customers with ads and editorial sponsorships, where this report or that is brought to you by a sponsor. It’s killing the viewing experience. How many ads and promos will cricket fans have to put up with in the upcoming summer Test series?

My local petrol station even encourages businesses to advertise on the petrol-pump handle, in addition to the pump itself. You can’t get in or out of the station without being inundated with ads.

Annoying ads are nothing new. The surprise is the breadth of companies that distribute ads for complementary businesses and how aggressively they promote them.

More companies these days expect customers who have paid for a product or service will sit through advertisements, which is payment again (in another form). They are desperate to find new revenue streams in a sluggish economy and have to work harder to reach customers who use digital recording devices to skip traditional ads, or businesses that prefer search-engine marketing.

Take online tickets as an example. It’s not enough to pay $120 for three footy tickets and another $13.50 in delivery fees (for emailing PDF tickets – what a rort!). Ticket distributors are finding new revenue streams by running more advertisements across their customer base, yet ticket-booking fees only seem to rise.

How long until other companies with large customer bases (such as banks, telcos and utilities) do the same? Instead of only cross-selling their products, they will promote complementary businesses for a fee.

Perhaps local councils can start pounding residents with commercial ads every time they pay their rates online. Sadly, there is huge potential for some organisations that have never advertised to earn new revenue.

My guess is hundreds of other companies with sizeable customer bases will run more ads and promotions across their network in coming years, for themselves and their partner companies, at a fee. As more online customer data is collected, ads will become more tailored, frequent and intrusive.

As a journalist, I should be among the last to complain about new advertising streams, given such revenue indirectly pays for full-time wages and freelance fees. Nobody can begrudge media companies developing more advertising opportunities to offset falling revenues. At least they offer some free content in return for putting up with online ads.

I also understand online content providers such as YouTube having short ads before videos begin. They have to monetise their service and it seems a small price to access so much content.

The problem is when companies that don’t usually advertise other products bombard their customers with ads, with little or nothing in return, because they have a captive audience. Or when companies make it hard to opt out of seeing advertisements, especially for unsuspecting audiences.

I can’t help think all this advertising at every turn is further blurring the message, numbing consumers and wasting money for businesses that use such channels.

Surely there is a backlash ahead for companies that push the advertising boundaries too far, and get in the way of customers who just want to get money out of the ATM, buy tickets online, and fill their car with petrol, without being bombarded by ads at every turn.

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