I’ll read a Huffpost article, and at the bottom there is always the clickbait. There’s one that always gets my attention because it’s so damn strange. It’s for Quicken Loans. It’s just a weird face that looks artificial. It’s a picture of a guy with giant eyes and a wispy beard. I guess I just don’t understand how that’s supposed to promote their product.
I’ll second the OP. That screwy looking guy in he clickbait photo guarantees that I am NEVER going to the Quicken Loan site. Wouldn’t anyway, but that guy is weird!
Many web sites use stock photos coupled with a teaser text, sometimes including a local reference. I’ve noticed the photos change even tho both the headline and body text may stay the same over time, and the photos do NOT look like the local people I know (and I know many of them).
And the teaser text sometimes has no relevance at all to the page you end up on. It’s clickbait at its worst.
That kind of image is supposed to make you think that it’s “real,” and not an actor.
I hear he’s been offered a job as the new Trivago spokesman. 
Clickbait ads do tons and tons of a/b testing. The pictures don’t mean anything, they’re just supposed to draw your eye. Does picture A or picture B get more clicks?
The only reason you saw all those “local mom discovers one weird trick” clickbait ads a couple years ago was that they try all sorts of ads, and for some reason more people clicked on that sort of ad, and so for a while every other ad had one weird trick. But it became so ubiquitous that it must have stopped working, since that particular phrasing is much rarer today.
He doesn’t look remotely “real” though. He looks like some sort of forest creature; an effeminate deer-man with that face and those eyes.
Is it by chance
THIS GUY?
Yeah, that’s it. All the faces of beautiful people in the world, and they chose this creepy looking fucker. How does that help sell their product?
Well, you looked at their ad. And you just mentioned Quicken Loans to the hundred or so people who will read this thread.
No, not everybody will run out and get a Quicken Loan. In fact, almost nobody will. But months or maybe years from now, long after the ad is forgotten, some of these people will need a loan. Where to look for a loan? For some reason Quicken Loans will pop into their head.
I just find that hard to believe. Because I’m going to remember the image, not the name, and that image doesn’t in any way connect with the loan. If my brain went to some sort of logo, then maybe I’d think about them.
I really think it is more that it’s strange looking, so people are likely to click to see what it’s about. That seems to be the reason behind all of the weird pics, as far as I can tell.
And, anyways, how big is the loan business outside of just going to your own bank? (Or those predatory payday loans, of course. Yuck.)
Yeah, I don’t buy into the “It’s all good press” school of advertising thought. Hey, even more people would be talking about it if it was a photo of a child biting the head off a kitten so let’s go with that, right? There’s obviously a point of diminishing returns to “But people talked about the ad” and sometimes a poor ad choice is just a poor ad choice.
There’s not much reason to click on it if it says “Quicken Loans” under it, is there? I mean, you know it’s not going to tell you a fascinating tale of the doe-eyed weirdo – it’s going to tell you about loans.
It’s one weird trick that has disrupted the clickbait industry.
“The secret that car insurance companies don’t want you to know!”
This is the teaser headline I see the most in my ad-space margins. And it usually has a profile picture of a pretty college age woman using a smart phone, or some other similar device. The woman herself is switched out for a different woman once a month, or so, but the overall framing of the photo (attractive woman looking at a smart device) is the same. I have never clicked on the ad, so I don’t know if it takes me to an insurance broker or not.
Do most people actually read the tag lines, or are there many folks who just impulsively click on stuff based on the thumbnail alone?
Thank you. I thought I was the only one who was getting sick of that random guy’s slightly unsettling face being every-freaking-where (at least in my online bubble).
Except “slightly strange picture that made you look” is an attempt to get you to click the ad, not an attempt to get you to notice the company behind the ad. Most of these clickbait ads don’t even bother to put their name on the ad.
It’s my opinion that clickbait ads are scams on multiple levels. Sure, they’re a scam on the sucker who clicks the clickbait. But they’re also a scam on the site hosting the ads, and the company paying for the ads.
The hosting site is getting paid. Other than feeling disreputable, how is that a scam to them?
It may be bigger than you think. I just closed a sale where none of the local banks would provide a loan for reasonable rates, and Quicken jumped on it with a good rate and none of the nitpicky requirements the banks had.
I’m sorry to see ads like those, but Quicken has been a lifesaver in the real estate business for some of us.
I can only wonder if both the web sites and the clients (like Quicken or an insurance company, or whatever) is innocent. Maybe I’m giving them too much benefit of the doubt, but could it be that the clients give their accounts to some agency that promises to bring them eyeballs, and doesn’t dwell on the details? Likewise, the web sites are promised dollars and not told the details. Think of how many times SDMB has been treated that way.
Quicken is the third largest mortgage lender in the U.S. Maybe the ads are working.
They must have heard us. Weird-face guy was replaced with four differently colored keys.
Why did you make me look? He’s still there 