Helping Google and its network of publishers address the rapid global rise of consumer ad blocking--by first improving the ad experience.
From late 2015 to spring of 2016, I was part of the New York-based Contributor product team, working from Google headquarters in Mountain View. My scope expanded to include advertising programs at Google that aimed to rebalance consumer experiences with ads so that publishers could build revenue and continue to create content for the web.
Contributor is a now-deprecated ad removal service that significantly reduced display impressions across Google's networks while compensating publishers and people who create free content. Instead of seeing ads, consumers would see either a negative space, a patterned image, or personal photos with a message thanking users for helping to fund the content they're consuming.
In simplest terms, Contributor allowed individual users to participate in impression bids on global ad exchanges. A monthly contribution ensured a reasonable level of competitiveness against major advertisers. Contributor users who won their own impressions would have ads from a given page removed completely, rendering a cleaner ad-free experience. And publisher content was micro-compensated by users subscribing in a simple manner to bid in ad platforms.
Alternative revenue models are gaining in importance as global ad blocker installations rise sharply. For publishers and people who earn their living by creating content, ad blocking represents a significant challenge. Arguably the story is still developing.
I became involved in broader efforts to respond to ad blocking in a way that reduces annoyance for users while helping publishers keep their content free for everyone to enjoy. I'll update this case study periodically as industry involvement grows. In the meantime, you may see Google executives make announcements about work and perspectives I had a small hand in shaping.
August 2016: Google announced that an irritating ad format will cause pages to rank lower in mobile search, signaling intent to discourage ads that annoy consumers, work against companies that advertise, and harm the ads/publisher ecosystem.
In September 2016, ad industry bodies announced the formation of The Coalition for Better Ads, a group driven by research measuring specific aspects of user annoyance with online ads. The Coalition enforces research-based standards that reduce annoyances that inspire installations of consumer ad blockers.
In early 2017, reports surfaced that ad-block software downloads slowed in consecutive quarters, including in the EU where ad blocking was quite popular.
Similarly, in early 2017, Google released its bad ads report, showing that it had removed impressions from a variety of questionable sites, including banning 200 fake news site publishers relying on Google ad network revenue.
In March 2017, the Coalition for Better Ads released user research and new ad standards for the industry to follow.
In April 2017, Google considers excluding non-compliant, irritating ads for users of Chrome through a native ad blocker.
June 1, 2017, Google launches the Funding Choices Program for publishers. I was fortunate to co-lead the naming effort for this product with Google’s Brand Studio and a Sustainable Advertising teams. Funding Choices allows publishers to display a message to ad-blocking consumers that explains how content may be compensated: either by turning off ad-blocking for the site or funding use of the site (usually page-level content) through Contributor.
January 2019, Google rolls out ad standard filters in Chrome Browser worldwide.
Working at Google is fun...and this time I was thrilled to be involved in strategic-level product marketing, communications, legal, regulatory, commercialization, international public policy, revenue modeling, design sprints, messaging research, product advisory, and naming decisions. I love working with people who care about putting the needs of users above all else. While I was a contract PMM, my contributions seemed distinct from what is typical of TVC roles.
And I got to visit qual labs in three major European cities in just a few days. (My sightseeing was limited to cups of amazing European coffees as I worked). Pictured below: qualitative research lab stairwells in London, Paris, and Berlin...and a gratuitous Instagram photo of a delicious Paris Opera crema.
I enjoyed working with my team greatly. They seemed genuinely sad when I moved onto my next client, as evidenced by the below ad unit of irony from one of my colleagues.
