Comments on: Aren’t Dogpiles Supposed to Stink?

By: Jill at Houston Real Estate

Jill at Houston Real Estate — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 04:56:38 +0000

Its wierd I am sure some vp at dogpile was like "I have great way to increase revenue". What they dont realize I guess is how they are going to drive visitors away. I had a friend that used dogpile once they realized them ads in the organic they quit.

By: Diana Adams

Diana Adams — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 20:41:57 +0000

Hey Tummblr -

You’re right about advertisers wanting to be buried in organic results, that users shouldn’t be fooled and a good point about non-sophisticated users being tricked. These are all reasons why the major Engines have taken to displaying sponsored links as sponsored.

It could be argued that meta engines like Dogpile aren’t held to the same constraints that the major search engines are, although Dogpile does label the results as sponsored (subtle tho it may be).

Thanks for the comment.

By: Tummblr

Tummblr — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 19:09:05 +0000

Most advertisers would probably love to be buried amongst organic listings. But isn’t this a pretty blatant way of trying to deceive non-sophisticated users? It’s just like sites that make the shade of the sponsored links box extremely similar to the rest of the page’s background (*cough* AOL *cough*). Users should never be fooled into clicking an ad because it looks just like an organic link.

By: Diana Adams

Diana Adams — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 14:09:01 +0000

Thanks for the comment Angela. I agree, I like what Dogpile has done, if the advertiser isn’t happy about having their ad inline with natural results because they’re afraid they’re going to get irrelevant clicks, then I think they’re forgetting what they’re doing - advertising!

Ad copy should flow smoothly and invite interest for learning more or purchasing that product - CLICK. Truth, meta descriptions should be doing the same thing, they are advertising.

(As for AOL, well, I can only say it was 1996, and a very long time ago forgive me? ;))

By: Angela

Angela — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 04:57:30 +0000

I loved Dogpile back in the day.. but I never got into AOL. What you’ve pointed out is really interesting, and I agree that good copy always ’sells’. I think it’s great that Dogpile has done this actually.