This one time… in Jamaica…

You ever been on a cruise where you visited some Caribbean island? Then, you might have a story similar to this one.

In fact, this same thing has happened several times. It is quite common on the islands… especially when you have a concentration of tourists.

This one time, I was in Jamaica. We had just gotten off the boat and my wife and I were just going to go walk around a bit.

We weren’t supposed to be in port for long. We didn’t really intend to do one of the excursions, so we figured we’d just go onto the island and see what’s going on.

The moment you step off the boat, there’s the obligatory posing for the stupid photo. But, then we began walking.

We immediately began to get ganged on by locals. People trying to sell us jewelry or some such stuff.

“No, thank you.”, we said.

Then, another 20 feet later and another person says the same thing. Trying to sell us some other trinket we have zero interest in.

“No, thank you.”, we said.

A bit further and it happens again. Only this dude… he was persistent.

“No, thank you”.

But, then he follows us. Walks with us. Tries to wheel and deal with us. Low balls his prices. Tells us his sob story.

It literally, at one point, got to a point where I had to stop and demand the guy walk away. Like, I had freakin’ HAD IT with this dude!

We proceeded to get out of the port area, but it isn’t as if the situation on the outside was any better. I guess when you come off a cruise ship and you have the American tourist vibe going on, they see you as wallets with legs.

One dude acted friendly for awhile, showing us some stuff because he wanted us to like his island. Then, before you know it, he was leading us into some back alley. Hell no. Slap that brake. Not going there.

Then, by this point, I was ready to head back. And on the way, we had another dude literally try to sell me drugs.

To this day, I must admit I have a bit of a yucky feeling about Jamaica. I’ve been there other times… done some great things. I also have known some great people who were from there. But, that one experience sort of put me off, I must admit.

Now, what does any of this have to do with our blogs? Or online business?

Well, isn’t this kind of what a lot of blogs feel like these days? Haven’t we all dealt with an online marketer who comes off that way?

When you go to a blog, how does it make you feel when the content you’re there for is littered with banner ads all over the place. Or you get interrupted by a big-ass popup.

News sites these days are some of the worse offenders. I’ve literally had news sites crash my browser due to ad overload. A big reason why I use Brave Browser today and block the ads.

When you go to a blog to read a post that is hopefully going to give you some information you’re looking for… it sorta sucks when you’re getting interrupted by things not even related to it.

But, that’s what a lot of bloggers have resorted to in an attempt to monetize. It is like they own the port, but they’ve allowed all those solicitors to hound people on the way through. So much so that people have gone blind to the ads, or utilize ad blockers.

And the crap thing about it?

All that interruption and annoyance with the ads… and all you make from annoying your visitor so badly is a few cents.

Interruption marketing doesn’t work very well. It is just a race to the bottom.

Doing things based on people actually REACHING for it is entirely different.

There’s no bad feelings involved. You don’t feel slimy. Your conversion rate is usually a lot better. And it just makes more money.

That’s why the Blog Monetization Model works the way it does. Done correctly, you’re never selling something to somebody if there isn’t some reach for it first. There has to be interest.

So, something to think about if your site is loaded with banner ads at the moment.

It is a bit of a different story if, at least, the ads are on point for the people visiting the page. I mean, I’m not saying all banner ads are equal. They’re not.

But, when the ads are pretty unrelated, or interruptive of the intention the person came there with, that’s a problem. And, with many of the big ad networks, it’s pretty common.