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"How The Internet Adult Industry Fooled Me" Copyright © 2002 By Gauher Chaudhry, All Rights Reserved. I was fooled. I received an email the other day from 123greetings.com saying that I had a greeting card waiting for me. But when I clicked on the link, I did not see any greeting card. Instead I was redirected to an adult site. You see, adult site promoters are getting smarter and even more unethical to try and drive traffic to their sites. These guys are so sneaky the have resorted to using big sites like Bluemountain.com and 123greetings.com to fool people into believing that they have a greeting card waiting for them. Now, how did they manage to redirect traffic from these greeting card sites to their own web sites? My best guess is that when they were filling in the message portion of the greeting card, they included a Java script that would be executed when the person opened the greeting card. This Java script would redirect the individual to the adult site. But it didn't stop there. When I tried to exit the site using my back button, another pop-up window opened. When I tried to exit that, another pop-up window opened. Before I knew it, fifteen pop-up windows had popped up displaying adult sites! If that isn't bad enough, these sneaky adult sites even eliminated the "X" button in the top right corner so I couldn't easily close the window. What do these morons think I would do? Did they think that since I could not exit the web site, I would just pull out my credit card and order a membership? Get real. When you try to leave these sites, you get trapped by Java scripts, which force them to view another site. This exit traffic is usually brokered out or sold to other sites. Closing and reopening your browser is the only way to get out of this Java script trap. But, don't get me wrong. One of the most effective methods of web advertising is the use of exit pop-up windows. Used properly, exit pop-up windows can capture email addresses, or help increase orders for your product or service, but only if they are used properly. Unethical marketers are trying to take advantage of sites that allow them to create text on HTML pages so that they can execute Java scripts when the web page is loaded. This sneaky example is even being exploited on pay-per-click search engines. Some pay-per-click search engines have loopholes in their software that can allow customers to create pop-windows in their description fields. Some customers are writing Java codes so that their web page will pop-up when a keyword is searched for on the PPC search engine. The customer does not even have to bid for the highest keyword, he or she just needs to have a listing somewhere on the first result page. Once the search engine retrieves all the bidders including his site and description for listing it will print the description onto the HTML page. Basically it is writing the Java code to an HTML file so that when the HTML page is fully loaded, it will execute the Java script. Presto! You have a pop-up window for your web site. What a deal. Not only do you not have to bid on the keyword, your site loads up automatically for free right in front of the surfers eyes. This same tactic can be used with free guestbooks on a variety of different sites. ## PLEASE NOTE ## I do not endorse this form of marketing because it is downright cheating and unethical. It is also a good way to destroy your reputation as a credible Internet marketer. My point is that you will find thousands of marketers behaving in an unethical manner in order to generate traffic and sales. When these guys abuse these tactics, it ends up hurting everyone. It only takes a few companies to tarnish the pop-up window industry. How would you feel if you bidded the highest on a particular keyword, only to have your competitor's web site pop-up right in front of YOUR potential customer? It takes months and even years to develop an excellent and credible reputation on the Internet. Resorting to these foolish marketing tactics listed above will destroy it in a matter of days. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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