Top all-time · #2560
The Ad Contrarian
Personal blog · adcontrarian.blogspot.combusinessdesign
The Ad Contrarian is a personal blog at adcontrarian.blogspot.com about business and design. Since 2009, 33 different Hacker News readers have linked it 37 times, most often “Advertising And The Future Of Apple (genius is non-transferable)”. The last post was in 2021, but the archive is still widely read.
Named one the world's most influential advertising and marketing blogs by Business Insider
Most-linked posts?
- Advertising And The Future Of Apple (genius is non-transferable)4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2011-08-30
- /3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2015-09-23
- Why online ads haven't built brands2 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2019-01-29
- Social Media's Massive Failure2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2011-03-24
What Hacker News says?
I always like to link an AdContrarian post https://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2021/01/the-inescapable-lo...
Comment linking /2021/01/the-inescapable-logic-of-ad-fraud.html
on “I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots”Submitted Apple Has Nothing To Say as a story · 51 points
HN discussionRegarding your first point, see: http://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2011/08/advertising-and-fut...
Comment linking /2011/08/advertising-and-future-of-apple.html
on “The Apple Watch”Submitted Advertising And The Future Of Apple (genius is non-transferable) as a story · 5 points
HN discussionThis is a very interesting point, which in fact plays in defense of original article. Bob Hoffmann, very influential figure in advertising ( http://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/ ) likes to point out that there were not that many companies which built their strong brand with online advertising only. OK, he is old and grumpy dude and he dislikes online ads, but this is a fair point. Once company becomes big enough, it st…
Comment linking /
on “What do we really know about the effectiveness of digital advertising?”Submitted Why Online Ads Haven't Built Brands as a story · 3 points
HN discussionThis was a good article from a while back that shows how every dollar spent on online advertising seems to only result in about 3 cents worth of actual ad views: https://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2017/01/display-ads-my-3-w...
Comment linking /2017/01/display-ads-my-3-worth.html
on “Facebook lured advertisers by inflating video ad-watch times: lawsuit”Submitted Why online ads haven't built brands as a story · 3 points
HN discussion> So many commenters are giving the customer a hard time for realizing, "99% of my budget is spent on zero value, i.e. fraud." This is something the Ad Contrarian hammers on a lot ( http://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/ ). There seems to a lot of fraud and BS in the system, but it's to the benefit of most players in the system to ignore that. Even for many ad buyers, it'd be embarrassing for the CMO to admit to having t…
Comment linking /
on “Chase had ads on 400k sites, then on just 5k, with same results”Submitted Why online ads don’t build brands as a story · 3 points
HN discussionLooks like this Aug/2011 prediction is being fulfilled: http://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2011/08/advertising-and-fut...
Comment linking /2011/08/advertising-and-future-of-apple.html
on “Why Apple's new ads look like Microsoft made them.”Submitted The Ad Contrarian: Advertising And The Future Of Apple [2011] as a story · 3 points
HN discussionBob Hoffman at the Ad Contrarian called this in January: "P&G To Online Ad World: We've Had Enough" - https://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2017/01/p-to-online-ad-wor... Digital advertising is rife with (what should be considered) fraud. Advertisers feel as though they are getting fleeced, and the advertising middlemen reap massive margins. The accountability isn't where it needs to be; there are websites that hide ads…
Comment linking /2017/01/p-to-online-ad-world-weve-had-enough.html
on “P&G Cuts More Than $100M in ‘Largely Ineffective’ Digital Ads”Submitted The Inescapable Logic of Ad Fraud as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSome good complementary links on this topic: • "Ads Don't Work That Way" ( https://meltingasphalt.com/ads-dont-work-that-way/ ) • "Why Online Ads Haven't Built Brands" ( https://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2019/01/why-online-ads-hav... ) Both discussing theorems for how advertising actually works, and why targeted advertising is counter-productive (for medium-to-large brands, anyway). The basic premise is that adverti…
Comment linking /2019/01/why-online-ads-havent-built-brands.html
on “Forget privacy: you're terrible at targeting anyway (2019)”Submitted Doomed: Why the Current Model of Online Advertising Can't Survive as a story · 2 points
HN discussionI recently read a book by Bob Hoffman, who runs a blog called the Ad Contrarian. It's a very funny book. He's an old-style TV/print ad guy who has been ranting about the stupidity of the online ad market for decades. He makes the point that the reason trad-ad gets so much money, is because everyone knows that ads are annoying. They're annoying on TV, they're annoying on radio and streaming services, they're annoying…
Comment linking /
on “Ad Blocking: The Unnecessary Internet Apocalypse”Submitted Online Advertising Is Corrupt at Its Core as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThis topic comes up a lot and Ad Contrarian has had my favorite takes on it. His latest- http://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2015/04/death-of-tv-continu...
Comment linking /2015/04/death-of-tv-continues-not-to-happen.html?m=1
on “TV is not dying”Submitted Honest Work Memos (The Ad Contrarian) as a story · 2 points
HN discussion"The Ad Contrarian" blog talks about this a lot. Marketers are apparently obsessed with millennials, but their parents (and older) are the ones with the money who really buy things. For example, the people targeted by car ads constitute 12% of the market, the rest is people older than them. http://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2013/08/the-youth-car-delus...
Comment linking /2013/08/the-youth-car-delusion.html
on “Marketers’ Fixation on the Millennial Generation”Submitted If you're a brand marketer and you want to grow, be wasteful as a story · 2 points
HN discussion- nl · 2011-04-15
There aren't many stories like that around, because it's so easy to experiment. If you put $20 or $100 or whatever in and it doesn't work for you then you just stop your campaign. It's hardly a horror story. The closest I've ever seen to a horror story was someone who wrote a piece about how Pepsi's loss in market share proves social media doesn't work [1]. That's a pretty controversial view, though [2]. In any case…
Comment linking /2011/03/social-medias-massive-failure.html
on “Ask HN: Where are the Facebook Horror Stories?” Submitted What Every CEO Needs to Know About Online Advertising as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Apple Goes a-Branding as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Ad Contrarian: Advertising And The Future Of Apple as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Social Media's Massive Failure as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted More Elephant Advertising as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Why Tiffany Doesn't Make Infomercials as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Battle Begins as a story · 1 points
HN discussion
