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That Went Over Like A Lead Balloon

Last week I added Kontera context links (links interspersed throughout the site that if clicked on, took you to commercial sites) to this site. Here are the results:

  • My page views cut in half.
  • I lost 10 RSS readers
  • I made $00.47

Therefore…

  • I have removed Konterra from this site.

(I realize that those bad things may or may not be related to Konterra, and if I made some obscene amount of money from them it would bear more research, but I really think them a bit disruptive)

What is your opinion of Konterra?

This entry was posted on Monday, June 11th, 2007 at 6:33 am and is filed under Blogging, the blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

9 Responses to “That Went Over Like A Lead Balloon”

  1. I did not notice it was there. I did not notice that it was gone. I think your sample may have been too small to determine a direct effect.

    My view - as long as it does not interrupt the text too much and it does not change your voice, do what you like. 47 cents will not get you much today but in a month or two you could get a Happy Meal. :)

  2. My opinion is that Konterra ads can lick my balls. Every time I see them on a website I immediately think “spammy”.

  3. So Kris, Why don’t you tell us what you really think ;-)!

    I am afraid I agree with you.

  4. I find Kontera ads slightly annoying, but only slightly. I could see how other people could despise them, though. I don’t think I’ve ever clicked on a Kontera ad.

    I’ve read web usability material that warns against using Kontera-style links, so that’s another point against them.

  5. I also have Kontera, but I never faced the issue of falling traffic. It has reduced the CTR of AdSense. And CTR of AdSense+Kontera is NOT the same with only AdSense. Still I’m planning to keep it for some more time and see how things shape up.

    By the way, even I run the same theme in my blog. Cool theme!

  6. I just started using Kontera on my own site a couple of days ago, so we’ll see how it goes. If it becomes a problem, I’ll definitely take it off, but I haven’t had any reader complaints yet.

  7. @Ashwin- I like the theme a lot (I do wish it were commented a bit more in the code, though).

    @Michi- Please let us know your results with Konterra, would you? And thanks for dropping by!

  8. As a visitor I hate Kontera ads because they often cover up text as I am trying to read it and they are just intrusive. But, I also understand that some webmasters make a lot of money through the program, so I guess you just have to figure out if it works for you (and if its worth losing some visitors over). In your case, I would say don’t use them because losing 10 readers and having half the page views is definitely not worth 46 cents.

  9. Interesting discussion, however I know very little about Konterra context links.

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