‘Cancel Ads’ Lets Readers Remove Ads for a Small Price

Advertising for blogs, news and most content based sites is our bread and butter. Like it or not, its what keeps us running and able to bring you the news, discussion and reviews we do. Despite this, we still get the occasional complaint over ads we display…

One company aiming to solve the conundrum is Cancel Ads. Ironically, its an ad network, but the USP is that it offers readers the opportunity to hide ads by paying the bloggers/publishers a small subscription fee.

The concept isn’t entirely new, Contenture launched a similar network some months ago which brought the concept to readers attention. How does it work? Founder Svetlana Gladkova of Tech Blog Profy explains:

CancelAds provides bloggers with a line of code to add to their template and buttons to allow readers to purchase blocks of time that the ads will be “cancelled”. Payment is made via PayPal and after the payment is made, readers surf ad-free for the purchased time period.

Advertising Age recently reported that 69 percent of internet users are not ready to pay to view their favorite sites ad-free, with 31% ready or considering it – it might just be a worthwhile move as it doesn’t entirely replace your current ad network, it merely provides an alternative for readers and publishers alike. GigaOM, a tech orientated blog network recently launched their own premium services which aside from no ads, also offered a number of additional ‘premium offerings’.

As long as Cancel Ads continues to improve the service (and promoting it) it should find its place on the mass of blogs and news sites out there.  Where I see it struggling is with your average technology blog reader who installs Ad-Blockers are part of their default extension set. But, as Gladkova so eloquently explains (by installing the ad-blockers) “you deprive people who create the content you enjoy of the advertising revenue they expect to earn by creating content and attracting visitors.”