Grab a strait-jacket, the co-founder of wikiHow, Jack Herrick, has implemented an ad strategy that could bring an end to the internet as we know it. He’s giving his users the ability to hide ads. I know, it’s crazy, but what’s even weirder is that Herrick stands by his marketing decision, and he says he’s reaping the benefits.

Jack Herrick, was quoted in WebProNews, and had this to say about his opt-out ad program, “The surprising thing is that letting people turn off ads has not hurt our revenues. If anything, treating users with respect was a contributing factor to why we saw more than 100% readership growth from 2007 to 2008. I often wonder why more Web sites don’t offer this ability.”

This remark makes sense in a way. There’s just a few problems I have with the overly cheerful view towards opt-out ads. First, how is he certain that having the opt-out program is what contributed to his site’s traffic increase? It seems to me that offering a quality place for people to view ‘how-to’ wiki pages should be what’s driving your traffic up.

wikiHow uses Google Adsense for its advertising, but explains how opt-out could entice some direct advertising as well, “By wikiHow not showing ads to people who don’t want to see them, we raise the ROI for advertisers. Advertisers don’t pay to show ads to people who don’t want to see the ads in the first place. And the people who keep the ads do so because they believe the ads have offers or information that might be useful to them. Opt-in ad viewers are better potential customers for the advertisers than those who opt-out.”

On this statement, I agree with him a bit more. What I think it ultimately comes down to, is if you have the right site to handle an opt-out program. wikiHow is a site that is extremely community based, and has quite a bit of interaction from its users. Therefore the traffic there is either a repeat visitor, or is staying for awhile to check out the site. Having an opt-out system makes sense, because of this time spent there. But how about sites with a short time span for visiting? How does giving the option for someone to turn off ads for a site only used for 2-3 minutes benefit?

I do think that wikiHow does benefit from the advertising model that Herrick has implemented. That doesn’t mean that it’s something that you should necessarily look into though. I think you should conduct some heavy research into how people are spending their time on your site. If you receive repeat visits, or long viewing sessions then opt-out might be something you want to look into.

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