Ask.com Pumping Up The Ads?
Tuesday, December 9th, 2008In a recent Techcrunch article, they talk about Ask.com (in their experimental search) displaying a disproportionate number of ads when a term is searched.
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/12/09/askcom-search-is-effectively-nothing-more-than-an-ad-engine/
They also point out that “Ask pulls other tricks as well, like making the entire horizontal space next to an advertisement clickable on the ad, which makes mistaken clicks happen quite easily as you are trying to scroll down.”
Showing more ads and “tricking” customers a sign of desperation. Customers want organic search with honest results, if a FEW ads are around that compliment what the user is looking for, then fair enough.
When it gets lopsided like this, it’s time to rethink the business, not trick customers.