Mystery links
New Web advertising tool gets results, draws criticism
By Benny Evangelista, Chronicle Staff Writer
Monday, July 30, 2001
©2001 San Francisco Chronicle
After Douglas Hoppe downloaded the hot new online file-sharing
program called KaZaa two weeks ago, random yellow hyperlinks
began appearing on his fledgling music site.
Hoppe became hopping mad when he realized words such as "jazz"
and "hip hop" had become hyperlinks, sending potential
customers to the site of BMG Music, one of the world's biggest
record labels.
Someone was hijacking his visitors, he thought.
But Hoppe soon learned that when he installed KaZaa, he also
unknowingly installed a bundled program called TOPtext, part
of a new online advertising technology called ContextPro developed
by EZula Inc. of San Francisco.
"It was like graffiti," said Hoppe, managing director
of XenoMusic.com, a Hungarian firm devoted to Eastern European
music.
"I thought it was a virus or some strange upgrade that
Bill Gates built into my computer," he said. "I wondered,
'Why are you sending my hard-earned visitors to (BMG), which
already gets a million visits a day?' "
TOPtext is an example of "contextual advertising,"
the latest attempt by online advertisers to reach the eyes and
minds of Web surfers. TOPtext turns existing words on a Web
page into hyperlinks that redirect a computer user to the advertiser's
site.
Critics such as Hoppe say TOPtext is an insidious form of online
advertising that will prove even more annoying than the recent
spate of "pop- under ads" that made the X10.com Web
camera site at once famous and reviled.
But EZula supporters say contextual advertising has promise
because it is far less obtrusive than other forms of online
and offline advertising while delivering only what a consumer
wants.
Founders of the 2-year-old Potrero Hill firm say TOPtext is
effective. Since its launch at the end of April, ContextPro
has garnered more than 1 million users and attracted about 30
advertisers, including Wells Fargo Bank and BMG Entertainment.
"We make it as subtle as possible for the users to give
them a tool that adds value," said EZula co-founder Henit
Vitos. "We finally can deliver the promise of advertising
on the Internet."
The program works very simply. Advertisers buy certain key words
or phrases that pertain to their business. An automobile-maker,
for example, would buy words such as "car" and "gasoline."
Once the program is installed on a computer and the Web browser
is activated, it searches for instances of "car" and
"gasoline" on any Web site visited and underlines
them in yellow.
The words then become a new hyperlink to the advertiser's Web
site. When the computer user rolls the mouse cursor over the
TOPtext word, it looks like someone marked it with a yellow
highlight pen. Next to it, a small text box appears showing
the advertiser's plug.
Clicking on the word sends the user to the advertiser's Web
site. If the highlighted Web site word was also a hyperlink,
the TOPtext gives a choice of going to the original destination
or the advertiser's site.
TOPtext is gaining wide distribution because of a deal EZula
made to bundle it with KaZaa, a new online file-sharing program
that has become one of the more popular substitutes for Napster.
Vitos said the 14-employee company is on track to become profitable
"within a month or two."
KaZaa was the fourth most downloaded program for PCs on the
Cnet Network's Download.com site and has been downloaded 4.9
million times since July 11.
For advertisers, the words are cheap -- about 15 cents per click,
although the rates are negotiable, Vitos said. So far, people
who are clicking on the highlighted words are following through
with some sort of purchase or other action 25 percent of the
time, Vitos said.
"It's a very effective advertising platform," Vitos
said.
Jerry Quinn, media director for ITraffic, a San Francisco online
ad agency that represents two clients using EZula, said TOPtext
was attractive because it targets customers who are already
thinking about a particular topic.
"If you can link (advertiser's) Web site in the context
of an article, you're talking about real relavance and you're
going to get a better response rate," Quinn said.
So far, the response to other types of online advertising such
as banner ads, once thought of as the logical online extension
of real-world billboards, has been spotty.
The latest fad is pop-under ads. Unlike their more worn-out
cousin, the pop- up ad that interrupts a Web site visit, the
pop-under ads appear later.
Pop-under ads helped Web camera seller X10.com get its product
in front of 32.8 percent of the Web's entire audience from January
to May, and collect 28 million unique visitors in May, according
to Jupiter Media Metrix.
But Jupiter analysts said the X10.com pop-under kept popping
under so much it became an annoyance. Jupiter said 73 percent
of X10.com visitors left the site in 20 seconds or less.
"The pop-under in and of itself is a terrible form of advertising
if it is overused and abused," said Jupiter senior analyst
Marissa Gluck. "The data showed they annoyed customers."
TOPtext, and similar technology introduced by NBCi's QuickClick
(formerly known as FlySwat) and the now-defunct Third Voice
Inc., are less intrusive, she said.
"What we've learned in the past few years is that contextually
relevant advertising performs well," Gluck said.
But there's a limit to what people will accept before it becomes
an annoyance, she said.
One online ad executive wonders if EZula is already testing
that limit.
"At the highest level, contextual commerce can be a really
powerful concept, " said Lex Sisney, chief executive officer
of Commission Junction, an online ad firm in Santa Barbara.
"It seems to me this is more of an intrusion on people's
behavior than a benefit," Sisney said. Moreover, EZula
critics are disturbed by the possibility of TOPtext being used
for Web-jacking by one advertiser against a competitor.
A similar debate caused Microsoft last month to back off plans
to add "Smart Tags" to its Windows XP operating system.
Smart Tags would have provided a link from any word on a Web
site to Microsoft or a Microsoft partner. Web site operators
feared the Redmond, Wash., software giant was trying to hijack
Web surfers.
When a Chronicle reporter using TOPtext visited the Universal
Music Group Web site, the phrase "Boyz II Men" displayed
a pitch for a major Universal rival: "The Best R&B
at BMG Music Club."
And at antivirus-softwaremaker Symantec's Web site, TOPtext
highlighted "virus protection" and displayed, "Click
for Virus Protection at McAfee," with a link to Symantec's
arch-rival, McAfee.com Corp.
That's what instantly angered Scott Ross, new media director
for the Web site of independent record label Moonshine Music
of Los Angeles, when he downloaded TOPtext along with KaZaa.
On his computer, stories about Moonshine's acts were linking
to BMG Music.
"I was screaming," Ross said. "What they are
selling is the words on my Web site that I paid somebody to
write." He also envisioned the beginning of a guerrilla
advertising war. For example, he said, athletic-shoemaker Reebok
could buy the word "shoe" to divert customers from
competitor Nike's site, forcing Nike to retaliate.
"It would make it very difficult for advertisers to make
money," Ross said.
Ross called EZula to block his Web site from TOPtext's effects.
But Hoppe wonders how many TOPtext users don't know they have
the technology and believe the highlighted words were added
by their favorite Web sites.
"These companies are preying on us people who are into
using computers, but not so tech savvy that we know what we're
doing," Hoppe said. "It's building a business model
in a clandestine way. It's not kosher in my book. It's a covert
operation."
EZula's Vitos said people who don't want TOPtext can easily
delete it by using their Windows "Add/Remove" program.
Also, she said the company tries to limit the number of TOPtext
words that appear to two or three per page.
"We do not bring anything in front of the user without
them wanting it," she said. "We're not forcing anybody
to have it. The choice is the consumer's. Our ultimate goal
is users will be happy."
Reprinted with permission from the author
E-mail Benny Evangelista at bevangelista@sfchronicle.com.
©2001 San Francisco Chronicle
For more information on new developments regarding KaZaa see
our articles:
Concerns about KaZaa Media Desktop
& Gnutella File Sharing Network User
Alerts
Consumers
These new programs effect you since they use spyware to do their
dirty work -- please check out our Consumer
Info section for more information on spyware and how to
protect your privacy!
WebMasters & Web Site Owners
Don't forget to check out our WebMaster Info to find out
how to protect your web sites from these new advertising threats!
(Additional note: GoZilla, Limewire, Bearshare, and Audiogalaxy
also include spyware & theftware programs such as Gator,
TopText, Cydoor and SaveNow! For more information see our
Help & Reference Guide)
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