FT gets creative with ad blocking software

The Financial Times began blanking out, for some users, a percentage of words in articles symbolizing the percentage of the company’s revenue that comes from advertising, reports Jeremy Barr of Ad Age.

Barr writes, “The proportion of words blocked isn’t scientific, and the Financial Times doesn’t break out the exact chunk of revenue that comes from ads, said global advertising sales director Dominic Good. ‘It’s more illustrative than specific,’ he said.

“The test group comprises registered desktop computer visitors who don’t pay for a subscription, about .075% of the company’s desktop traffic. Some ad-blocking members of this group won’t see any new messaging, some will be asked to whitelist the website’s ads but can still read regardless, some will see articles with many words blanked out if they won’t whitelist the site, and some will be blocked outright if they don’t whitelist the site.

“The company will evaluate the results after three or four weeks.

“About 20% of Financial Times traffic comes with an ad blocker running, which Mr. Good said is in line with the newspaper’s competitors. Hiding a percentage of words in articles conveys two messages, he said: There are consequences for using ad-blockers, and the Financial Times depends heavily on advertising to produce high-quality journalism.”

Read more here.