An
Anatomy
of Anchors
| Business popups: the point is to distract! (efferent) |
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In 1997, Nielsen noticed that advertisers did not recognize the potential of the anchor to draw people in: " It is amazing how little most Web ads work at attracting clicks: they should recognize that they are one end of a hypertext link and that they have to create expectations as to the value of going to the other end of the link. [102]" In 2004, businesses are beginning to understand the bottom line potential of these value expectations. Voytech, a company advertising to create banners promises "Good banners work on two levels. They engage the mind of customers and at the same time they deliver a selling message. Just order one from our creative team and see for yourself. [120] " Today, many web ads are attractive anchors, telling little stories or giving content that pulls at the heartstrings and presumably at the purse strings of web surfers. The art of commercial anchors is not well defined, and the efficacy is fiercely debated. Even the presumption that anchors should be triggered to be effetive is questioned. Eye tracking surveys, in particular, have questioned this. The University of Southern California's Marshall School of Business 2000 study concluded that "Banners lead to brand awareness. Click-through rates might be low, but in the long run, awareness is more important than click-through. [82] " Anchors work to entice people to part with their credit card numbers in various ways:
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