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Why Seth Godin is Totally Wrong - No Pity Clicks!!!

Posted by Mike Volpe on Fri, Oct 17, 2008
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seth godin no pity clicksSeth Godin is a marketing genius, and I normally agree with him on most everything.  I am a giant Seth fanboy, and even have a photo of me with him.  So, don't interpret this as Seth-bashing.  I just think he called this issue wrong.

 

Seth Godin wrote an article called Ads are the New Online Tip Jar that basically asked blog and website readers to click on ads to support bloggers in what amounts to "Pity Clicks".

 

This is a short sighted and bad idea that actually does not help anyone.  Here is what would happen if people started to actually go with this "Pity Click" program.

 

Why Seth Godin's "Pity Clicks" are Bad Idea

  1. Blogs would get a short term boost in revenue from the additional clicks.
  2. Advertisers would see that these useless "pity clicks" did not buy anything or register for anything on their website, making them (the ads and clicks) pretty useless.
  3. Advertisers would see their ROI drop from these ads, causing them to either cancel the ads or negotiate lower prices.
  4. Bloggers would see ad revenue drop because they asked for "pity clicks" on their ads.
  5. We end up back where we started.

A business (like a blog) needs to figure out how to both create value and capture value.  Many blogs create value (for their readers) but have not figured out how to capture it.  The reason why ad revenue on most websites is low is because banner ads don't work!  Marketers need to use more inbound marketing, and many people are discovering this and using fewer banner ads.

Seth Godin's idea for "Pity Clicks" might be clever, but it is not sustainable in the long term and does not make sense to me.  What do you think?

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COMMENTS

Seems a bit kitchy to me. I don't see the point in encouraging people to go somewhere and not buy something. I can see the impressions adding up, but to what??? It would be interesting to see someone try it and then track the results.

posted @ Friday, October 17, 2008 10:09 AM by Jon-Mikel Bailey

Mike, I totally agree with you on this one. Wouldn't that make the job of the seo/marketing company for the "clicked" ad much harder. Now they have to go back to their client and tell them that their conversions are down x% which would make it look like the marketing/seo company is not doing their job. I am just not clear why a marketing genius would give tips to make his job harder.

posted @ Friday, October 17, 2008 10:18 AM by Matt Pramschufer

Gotta agree with you here. Pity clicks would be about the same as click fraud in my opinion and definitely useless for all the reasons you explain here.

posted @ Friday, October 17, 2008 10:37 AM by chrystie

i totally agree. it's just plain fraud. it looses the value of the ads.

posted @ Friday, October 17, 2008 10:44 AM by WebSlicers

Do you buy something, anything in every store that you go in at the mall, just to make the store owner happy?... NO Same logic here

posted @ Friday, October 17, 2008 11:53 AM by Pierre Fregeau

Mike, you didn't get a "pity click" from me ... but you do get an "I agree!" 
 
Seth is great - but he is human and sometimes he just misses the mark. This is one of those times. 
 
Great call.

posted @ Friday, October 17, 2008 1:15 PM by kevinmhuff

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