PCWorld.com - Latest Online Ad Gimmick: Hyperlinks (Aug. 3/01)
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Latest Online Ad Gimmick: Hyperlinks
By Tom Spring August 3, 2001
Advertisers try aggressive (and annoying) hyperlink technology
to make the Web pay.
Move over spam, there's a new ad scheme called Toptext that is
delighting advertisers and drawing ire from users who view it as yet another
obnoxious online advertising gimmick.
Popularized by a California firm called Ezula, Toptext technology highlights
words on a Web page which then link you to an advertiser. But for those who
have unknowingly downloaded and installed Toptext, the technology is more a
scourge than a revolution.
Toptext works with Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser 4.0 and
above. It's typically bundled with free software programs and is currently being
distributed with popular file sharing software such as IMesh and KaZaa.
But while advertisers are seeing results with TopText, critics
view the technology merely as the latest iteration of intrusive advertising
and liken it to pop-up and pop-down ads.
Nonetheless, Ezula says its Toptext program has been downloaded
more than 1 million times since its April launch of the service. Currently it
is working with 30 advertisers, including Wells Fargo Bank, and highlights 7000
keywords.
"There is always someone who is going to complain,"
says Henit Vitos, Ezula's co-founder. Most complaints, she says, are because
people didn't pay attention when installing the program Toptext came bundled
with. She points out that you can simply uninstall Toptext through Add/Remove
programs feature in Windows.
Keywords appear on Web pages with thick yellow lines below them
and become hyperlinks that connect to advertisers. For example, when the word
"hip hop" appears on a Web page you can click on it and you're taken
to an advertisement for BMG Music Services.
