Source: Xinhua.
If a video site played a 90-second countdown ad that non-members could also close with one click, would you still buy membership? If the “influencer shares” and free “professional reviews” on lifestyle platforms were clearly labelled “advertisement”, how would you feel? If you were told plainly that the streamer calling you “family” is doing an ad, would you still order without hesitation?
The State Administration for Market Regulation recently opened its draft Measures for the Administration of Internet Advertising for public comment. The draft stipulates that internet ads must be closable with one click, and countdown-gated closing is banned; anyone selling goods or services through paid rankings, experience sharing or consumer reviews must conspicuously label it “advertisement”; and where live-stream content constitutes a commercial advertisement, the room operators and marketers must shoulder the duties and obligations of advertising operators, publishers or endorsers. Thirty-one new rules signal that internet advertising may see major change, and the business models of the companies involved may need adjusting.
Too often, internet advertising is like a melon twisted off the vine before it is ripe. A hit comedy sketch recently turned invasive internet ads into jokes: over-long countdown ads, brainwashing ads repeated a dozen times, malicious pop-ups that refuse to close, ads that trick you into buying membership, “acted” live-stream selling. Audiences laughed knowingly, with deep helplessness behind the laughter.
Platforms use their technological edge to set terms favourable to themselves while consumers sit in relative disadvantage, and the right to choose is quietly squeezed. The draft advertising measures would use regulation to rein in dominant or overreaching uses of technology and hand more of the power of choice back to consumers, which is worth looking forward to.
Internet advertising is a legitimate existence. Websites pay huge sums for licences, original programming and daily operations, and without matching ad revenue their business models would not survive; there is nothing wrong with that. But in reality, some companies devote much ingenuity to reinventing ad formats and little effort to improving the quality of membership services. On some audio and video sites, membership benefits have shrunk to “fewer ads” and “VIP viewing privileges”; some sites whose business models rest on paid rankings, influencer shares and professional reviews wallow in monetising traffic, drawing user complaints and damaging their own community atmosphere.
In recent years some advertisers, counting on the reality that consumers cannot avoid internet ads, either push products stiffly or force placements, and ads lacking creativity and polish wear people down. Advertisers and consumers should be moving toward each other, supply meeting demand; forcing the issue wastes ad money and defeats the original purpose. Advertisers need to refine creative content and raise the quality of what they put out.
The new rules may become an external push and an opportunity for platforms and companies to shift operations from extensive to intensive. Encouraging more of them to put energy into product innovation, better membership operations and stronger member stickiness could make internet advertising friendlier and more likeable, a genuine win-win.
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