Everyday, us humans (probably pigeons too) see thousands of ads. There’s almost no way of ignoring them. The thing about most ads is, even though you looked straight at them, you don’t have to look at them, read them, whatever. There’s a billboard up ahead. Close your eyes kids.

Television ads can be avoided by a swift change of the channel, magazine ads can be ripped out, and transit ads, well, you might have to close your eyes and miss your stop.

There is, however, a type of ad that get’s right in your grill, right in the way of what you’re doing. They are the worst ads in the world. They are pop-ups. I’m not talking about the kind of ads that pop-up onto another window, starts talking you, scaring the shit from you. Those ads are gone after quickly hitting the ‘X’ in the corner.

The worst ads in the world are the ads that pop-up onto the page you’re on. The page you’re reading, watching, doing something on. It pops-up, delivers some lame message, and then laughs in your face as you attempt to find the close button. That close button is never in the traditional right hand corner. We always find ourselves scrolling down to the end of the page, or heading to Contact Us where it’s waiting in patience. Not really, but you get my drift. These ads are the ultimate interruption, the ultimate piece of work that makes advertising bad. But they don’t have to be, because as long as it costs money to own a website, companies will want that spot.

Since companies will want that spot, why can’t they use that spot and reward you for being the victim. For the past three years I’ve been told, as a future advertiser, I need to reward the audience. They’re taking their sweet time to stop and look, I need to thank them for their time by delivering something good and effective.

This is when the client needs to back down and let the creative folk do their work. If a company sends you a bad ad in the most annoying way, they’ll be remembered for the wrong reasons.

Recently I saw this ad from IKEA. Right off the bat you can notice that it looks good to the average eye. Then once when you start reading it, you can relate to it. Unless you’re living alone, everyone shares a bathroom. So not only is there a compelling truth there, there’s even a concept. A web ad with a concept: a rare breed.

Web ads are annoying. There’s no way of getting around that. So if we’re going to annoy our audiences, we should give them something they want to see for those few seconds before they run away. That’s being remembered for the right reasons.