Will Interstitials Hurt Your Rankings

[Brad]

Will it, Bunkie?

http://www.webpronews.com/interstitials-may-start-hurting-your-search-rankings-2015-06?

Probably FUD, but I really hope it's true.  I put interstitials right in there with popups/unders, rats and other vermin.  Almost every site, large or small, that I go to is not only packed with more ads than a down on their heels tabloid in Detroit, but just as I start reading some frigging interstitial blooms like a cataract over the article: Subscribe, Register, Take our Effing Survey that is just like the other guys Effing Survey, Buy Our Sheit, Like Us on Spacebook!, yadda yadda yadda.

All I want to read is one of your articles and you keep putting stuff in my way.

We now resume our normal programming.

[Rooftop]

I think that heavy use of them hurts it already, just not in a direct way. If people aren't prepared to work their way past them then you'll be picking up the crappy experience signals all day.

I also think that is telling that Google's "almost an interstatial" offering (mobile vignette ads) never show on first page load.

I'm pretty pro-ad, but I hate them.  The worse are badly coded ones.  I couldn't access inc.com for about 6 months because their interstatial couldn't be closed on my phone.

[Brad]

I always thought legitimate sites wanted to get me to their article as swiftly and smoothly as possible.  If I have to clear away interstitials and other spam I'm just as likely to hit the back button.

But even legit sites are becoming more dodgy, more made for Adsense-ish, than ever before.  Besides interstitials:

1. So many ads the page takes forever to load or just hangs.
2. Autoplaying video ads, autoplaying anything (must die!)
3. Laying out a article that would barely fill one page but making it take up 5 pages just to get ad impressions.
4. Ads that expand out like drawers opening from top, sides, bottom pushing what I'm reading around and making it more difficult to read.
5. Spammy headlines "... but what happened next was just awesome." 


I thought the idea was NOT to annoy the visitor to death.  It seems like many pages go out of their way to do just that. 

I try to never begrudge a site their ads, and I don't use an ad blocker but it seems like I'm seeing more interstitials and intrusive ad devices on more and more websites.  It's getting to be more attactive to do something else. besides surf the web.