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Badly Placed Web Ads: Hilariously Inappropriate

by Leila Brillson on August 15, 2009 at 04:15 PM


One of the nice things about Gmail is that, even though the e-mail service generates ads by scouring messages for keywords, certain terms and phrases turn the paid content off. Therefore, breakup letters might promote dating sites, and angry notes might inspire anger management online courses, but e-mails about serious stuff typically produce nothing but blank space. Call it contextual advertising with a conscience. A good practice, especially because we bloggers enjoy finding drastically inappropriate ads and grabbing screen shots, creating awkward galleries of 'Shark Week' promos running alongside delicious and fishy 'Long John Silver's' banners (see above).

Once upon a time, ads on the Net involved punching an elf or shooting a duck. Now, with contextual targeting, an idyllic and discounted Greek vacation promo might run alongside a story about violent riots in Greece. Buzzfeed has rounded up 23 of the most ridiculous offenders (that have been caught, of course). Behold an MSNBC article featuring a picture of Bush, which eerily resembles the Career Builder monkey in the neighboring ad. And then there's the story about an Olive Garden E. Coli outbreak, sitting alongside a coupon for the popular Italian restaurant restaurant.

Advertising works when the ad lingers in the mind of the viewer after she has clicked away. Unless the company has a massive budget and is able to create a visual extravaganza (think Samsung's Jet adverts or the Pomegranate 'phone' for Nova Scotia), ads should generally veer towards weird and random rather than personalized and contextual. Then, a faux pas like pairing a pregnancy announcement with weight-loss supplement pop-ups can be avoided. Then again, maybe Web advertisers are on to something; bad taste usually generates big laughs. [From: Buzzfeed]


Tags: ads, bad taste, BadTaste, gmail, main, news, targeted advertising, TargetedAdvertising, top, web ads, WebAds

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