I don’t know about most people but I tend to go quite a long way to block pop-up, pop-under, roll-in, roll-out, roll-over, auto-click, and other obtrusive, annoying kinds of advertising seen around the ‘net. I also don’t know quite when SFDC decided to put one on the home page after you log-in either…. I’m not one to stand for things that really annoy the living hell out of me, especially when they get in the way of clicking the too-often-used Setup link. (Admittedly I should Bookmark the thing but….) So instead of, well, raising my concerns with SFDC, I took matters into my own hands. Here’s the ad, read on to see how to disable it.
The easiest way to disable the Advertisment from floating down is with a very small piece of JavaScript. As always, on the home page, my favorite JavaScript injection point is in the “Messages & Alerts” Homepage component. Add one if you dont have one, or just add this snippit to your existing component:
<script type="text/javascript">
setCookie('sawBanner', 1);
</script>
License
This work is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License.
I felt exactly the same way. While the logic was probably that it wouldn’t impact the end users much, it is a distinct annoyance for all of us that use the Setup link on a regular basis - and we’re the user base who are often champions of the product.
Further, I believe that at least 95% of us who click that Setup link know about the AppExchange. Unless the goal was to get end users pressuring or finding apps for their admins, this banner marketing campaign seems to have missed the mark both in terms of acceptance and audience (end users or admins?). It also seems like there are lots of less annoying ways to get the word out on the AppExchange.
Thanks for the turn-off tip!
Comment by Chris — September 5, 2006 @ 10:50 am
That’s not just a pet peeve, it’s a major issue with their service that’s been grating with me for quite some time. The last major issue was when they started sending a seperate ad e-mail with every new account (seperate from the login info e-mail). I sent them a nice e-mail last time about the number of ads but nothing has really improved. I believe I counted a total of 11-13 ads (or something like that) that every new user has to deal with. The pop-down ads are a new low.
Comment by E.J. — September 5, 2006 @ 11:00 am
The other thing that bothers me about this is they are constantly trying to upsell to our users. They even did this when we were piloting SFDC, which did more to hurt the sale than help it.
The main problem with this is wasting my time assuring our users that yes, we’ve already looked into product XYZ and it’s not for us. Trying to drive sales through the end users is a sure way to annoy the administrators and decision makers.
Comment by E.J. — September 5, 2006 @ 12:39 pm
FYI - You can opt-out of their email marketing, though it did seem to take me several tries to accomplish this, both for my Developer Org and live instance.
Also, keep in mind I don’t mind SFDC advertising quite so much on the Developer Orgs. Seeing as they’re given out for free (obstensibly to develop for their platform).
—
E.J. In response to your comments about explaining to your users that you’ve looked into XYZ….
AMEN! The biggest offender in that category for me has always been the “Discover Summer ‘06″ or “What’s New In…” buttons on the home page (right side below the tabs). Fortunately / Unfortunately for us with Summer ‘06 I haven’t gotten 1 call or email since the button went live.
Comment by heretic — September 5, 2006 @ 5:45 pm
Cross-Sell upsell……
This post from the Heretic raises an interesting question: How can partners sell their new products to end-users? In the B2C market it’s easy. They guy using the product has the power to purchase and install it. No-one else is…
Trackback by Where's the Upside ? — September 6, 2006 @ 9:44 am
[…] In my last post I basically ripped apart an SFDC AppExchange advertising campaign as being overly obtrusive and obnxcious. […]
Pingback by Salesforce Heretic » The AppExchange… — September 6, 2006 @ 10:32 am
Heretic, that’s only because they didn’t actually release anything in Summer ‘06.
Ok, lead auditing is nice, why isn’t it on every object though? It would be especially usefull with Opportunities.
Comment by E.J. — September 6, 2006 @ 11:04 am
Andrei Agassi looks like Craig Skinner…
On the subject of annoying pop-ups. I really hate my computer making unexpected noises. Pop-ups I can deal with. But talking heads, movies etc. I really only want when I say I do. Every time I go to www.salesforce.com Craig…
Trackback by Where's the Upside ? — September 7, 2006 @ 3:33 am
I asked our salesforce.com CSM and they were able to disable the button and banners.
Comment by whats the deal — September 10, 2006 @ 8:37 pm
They’ve got a lot of cajones throwing ad banners onto the screen. As a proponent of their platform, I am finding it harder and harder to defend their shenanigans to my paying users.
Comment by SSome Farker — September 18, 2006 @ 10:18 pm
I agree. These banner ads are more than annoying. If this were a server application we would not allow a company to include ads in the UI, why should we put up with it just because they have the technical abilities to slip it in after we’ve signed up?
Shame on Salesforce.com!
Comment by CRM user — October 17, 2006 @ 4:24 pm
[…] For instructions on how to use this code, please see my original post on the topic. […]
Pingback by Salesforce Heretic » More Obtrusive Ads… — November 2, 2006 @ 12:12 pm