Google is experimenting with a new ad format that is being run on select publishers’ sites in North America and Europe. The ever-annoying expanding ads. However, it seems that they may have gotten them right, unlike other networks.
We’re excited to introduce to you expandable ads, a new type of ad that can appear on your pages. Expandable ads are rich media ads that can expand beyond the original size of the ad unit, following a user-initiated action. This creates more real estate for the ad, allowing for more interaction from interested users. For instance, expandable ads may stream a movie trailer, show video game clips, or display various views of an item for sale.
AdSense says that the “user-initiated action” is not hovering your cursor over your ad, but clicking the banner. So with AdSense’s expandable ads, you won’t have the problem of accidentally expanding the banner over the page content because the mouse was in the wrong place.
Additionally, there are restrictions on the expanded dimensions of the ads. They can not be greater than twice the size of the unexpanded banner.
Has Google succeeded in making an annoying ad type bearable?
