Banner Blindness refers to the idea that most people don’t even notice display ads anymore.
Whether by consciously avoiding looking at them or by subconsciously ignoring them, the majority of people simply don’t notice most ads.
This makes sense when considering that the majority of clicks on ads are undertaken by 1% of people. Ignoring for a moment that 1% of the entire population of the internet is still a huge amount, this means that for the other 99% of people there is simply no reason to look at those ads.
I’ll put it this way – if someone on the street hands you a flyer for a zoo (but you hate animals for some reason), you’ll likely just throw it away without looking at it. This wastage occurs in all forms of advertising, but like with all things digital, it’s just easier online.
After seeing thousands of websites each, we all know where online ads are usually placed, and so it’s easy to just not look.
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