Are the ads on your website a help or a hindrance? In some instances, website ads are an extremely effective way to make money online. However, ads can also affect your website in many different ways. Below are five ways ads are killing your website.

Too Many Ads Ruin Your Website Visitors User Experience

When someone visits a website they prefer a website that has a clean, simple layout and that is easy to navigate. This is not always the case if you include a large number of ads. Some ads take up a lot of space too and the person visiting your website may find it difficult to locate the content they want to read or view on your website.

Ads Slow Down Your Website

The more features you have on your website, the slower it becomes. Ads in particular can be slow to load because they often include images, video or scripts that communicate with other websites.

Your online visitors and the search engines don’t tolerate slow loading websites like they did in the past. If your website doesn’t instantly appear when someone types in your URL, these potential visitors and shoppers will go elsewhere and find a website that does respond quickly.

Search engines like Google, realise this and their algorithms are able to identify websites that are slow to load because they contain ads. Once your website is considered to be slow by the search engines, they will penalise it and it won’t rank as high as it should.

Lower Conversions

When you depend solely on ads, you get one shot to get a click or generate a sale. However, smarter website owners give themselves a fighting chance to make more sales and build their customer list by focussing more on providing high quality, ad-free content.

When you provide value in this way, shoppers and customers are more likely to return to your website. As well as this, you can ask them to subscribe to your blog posts and email lists. Eventually, you are in a position where you can build stronger relationships with your website visitors and shoppers, which is not possible if you only display ads on your website.

Website Visitors Are Becoming Immune to Online Ads

In many cases, website ads have become an unwanted distraction. When people first saw online ads they were more likely to take more notice of them and click on them. This is no longer the case and many types of website ads have become redundant.

Increased Bounce Rates

Every website owner should aim to keep visitors and shoppers on their website for as long as possible. When people see a large number of ads, they normally leave quickly and won’t return again. This reduces your chances of generating income on your website and the search engines also take notice of the number of people who leave a website quickly (also known as the ‘Bounce Rate’).

It’s easy to place ads on a website. However, this practice can kill your website, so you should think carefully about how you intend to generate revenue.