10 Best Practices to Make Your Popunder Campaigns Successful (2024)

Written 23 May, 2024 by

John Paul

Pop ads have been around since the dawn of the internet. They have earned themselves the title of the original sin of the internet! But that’s because Pops must be created properly to ensure they don’t irritate the users and help instead.

Pop ads include Popups, Popunders, and sometimes Interstitials. In this article, we’ll focus on Popunders as the least intrusive of the Pop trio. Popunders might not always get the desired attention, but our article is to fix that! We’re here to explain why they are a tried-and-true classic of affiliate marketing and how to tune up Popunders for maximum impact.

Why Popunders Remain Good

All Pops need no introduction, they just appear on top, behind, or in transition between the main web pages. Thus, Pops require no creatives, making them newbie-friendly, compared to other ad formats.

Pops enjoy a relatively low Cost Per Mille (CPM) of $0.5–1. They are immune to banner blindness and match any website, because they appear outside the main browsing tab. You can design them any way you want.

Compared to its siblings, a Popunder remains hidden behind the main window until the user decides to interact with it. Popunders also work with all kinds of devices imaginable and can be customized to target very specific audience segments.

Popunder ad format generates a high volume of traffic and work with almost any vertical:

  • Dating
  • eCommerce
  • Finance
  • Gaming
  • iGaming (Betting & Gambling)
  • Software & Utilities
  • Sweepstakes
  • Smartlinks

And even though 35.7% of users use ad blockers, the bane of Pop ads, there are ways to ensure the ads reach the final user.

10 Tips for Better Lead Generation with Popunders

We’ve compiled a few tips on how to increase the efficiency of Popunders. Use them when creating and optimizing campaigns to improve your campaign performance.

Popunders are good. But HilltopAds knows how to make them even better! Register now and boost your income!

Use Spy Tools for Reconnaissance

Competitive intelligence is essential for beginners and veterans alike. Knowing what’s trendy can save you a lot of trouble when launching a campaign. And this is where spy tools save your marketing day.

Discover the most successful angles, approaches, and funnels for various offers. Since Popunders require no creative, they are not the main subject of spying. However, you can check out promotional tactics for Push notifications and Native ads, as they use a similar logic.

Spy tools have a wide range of applicability. Besides finding an ideal approach, you can see which offers and verticals work here and now. Thus, you can decide which you’d rather prefer to pick. Also, you can figure out which landing pages convert, and whether pre-landers are needed or not.

Solve Trust Issues with Pre-Landers

Popunders require no creative. This is helpful to start a campaign, but can also cause an abrupt transition to purchasing without warming up the user first. Offers with high financial commitment suffer from bouncing users the most.

Pre-landers help to prepare the user and win over their trust… provided they are properly made.

Pre-landers also help to make non-compliant offers acceptable. Some ad networks frown upon Auto-Downloading Software, as it can be invasive and disruptive to user experience (UX). However, with the help of pre-landers, you can inform the users what they are getting into, efficiently turning Auto-Downloading Software into just Software.

Localize Offers to Resonate Better

Localization is more than translation. Besides language, you should ensure you hit the bullseye with cultural specifics. Use the Country Comparison tool in tandem with spy tools to get the portrait of the audience.

While Gaming and Investment products might benefit from worldwide coverage, this is not the case for Dating, where users search for local singles. Consider adding dynamic elements to your copies, like dynamic city insertion.

Don’t forget about the rules of punctuation. Even though English, French, German, and Spanish are Latin-based (at least partially), their punctuation varies drastically: „Wie geht es dir?”, fragte sie (“How are you?”, she asked.) — see the quotation marks.

Speed Up Your Pages

Nobody likes slowly loading pages. Even if your landing page is super interactive and elaborate, people won’t wait for it to render, if it takes too much time.

Control your loading speed with the help of Google’s PageSpeed Insights. Keep in mind that mobile phones might perform slower, thus requiring even lighter pages. Try doing the following to speed up the web pages:

  • Lazy loading, when content is loaded partially
  • Cleaning the code: excessive lines, comments, formatting, spaces, and commas
  • Compress files, e.g., using Gzip
  • Eliminate render-blocking resources
  • Leverage browser caching by prolonging how long your files must be stored
  • Minimize the number of redirects
  • Pick a server closer to the user’s location
  • Use a Content Distribution Network, similar to BitTorrent protocol
  • Pick the right file format for images (PNG for less than 16 colors and JPEG for photographs)
  • Mask loading process with an interactive element, e.g., a spinning wheel to prolong the user’s staying and get away with slow pages

Run Multiple Ad Copies

On the one hand, Popunder-based funnels are easier to test, because there are fewer variables. On the other, your landing page becomes your main hook and conversion driver. Thus, every element of Popunder bears even more significance than usual: colors, page layout, Call To Action (CTA), etc.

A/B testing is important in general, but in case of Popunders it’s crucial. It’s the only point of contact, which tends to exhaust its potential over time.

Pay Attention to the Metrics Early On

Popunders generate tons of data from the get-go. Thus, you can start optimizing your campaign early on. You’ll start seeing the best performing lander versions, OSes, and zones.

Use 3rd-party trackers to monitor the performance of your Popunders. Once you discover your best option, use it as a control variable, against which all tests are run.

Mind Your GEO and offer

Tier 1 and emerging countries tend to perform better with Popunders: Northern America, Western Europe for seasoned veterans or India, Brazil, and Southeast Asia for starters.

Try to find SOI offers or any others with simple payout models. Pops can be perceived as intrusive, thus you need to reassure the user that their time is worth it immediately. You need to communicate a solution to the user’s problem quickly, e.g., Dating: “I’m 1 km away, wanna talk?”.

Design Your Form Properly

Introduce Popunder elements gradually. Hide the form behind a CTA, so that the user can focus on the freebie first. Once they feel like claiming the bonus, release the form — it will be perceived much better in this context.

When making a form, either limit yourself to up to 3 fields or shoot for the stars and go for 8 fields and beyond. You can use Popunders to collect emails only and then conduct follow-up campaigns, introducing your offer gradually.

Finally, don’t forget to add a progress bar if you require a lot of information. Be honest with your audience, especially if they are to suffer the ordeal of being interviewed for about 15 minutes.

Separate Mobile and Desktop Campaigns

This applies to all the verticals in general, but in case of Popunders this is especially important. See, this ad format is easier to detect on desktops, due to mobile screen sizes and the way Popunders work. Besides, traffic prices for various devices vary, thus they require unique approaches.

Add FOMO and Gamification

Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) is crucial to engage the users when using Popunders. Timers and limited stocks help to highlight the offer’s uniqueness, which is especially helpful in promoting high-ticket items.

Gamification elements like a spin-the-wheel or scratch game help to capture the user’s attention and retain it for longer. Alternatively, opt for videos, but games are just more addictive.

Bonus Tip: Make Sure Your Ads Reach the Target

What kind of top 10 is that without #11? Remember us talking about 35% of users opting for ad blockers? Work with reputable ad networks, integrating anti-ad blocking solutions.

Stop spending money on ads that are not delivered! Sign up for HilltopAds to ensure your Popunders reach the target user no matter what.

Conclusion

Pop ads have been a staple of online advertising, with Popunders standing out as the least intrusive option. Despite their stealthy nature, Popunders offer valuable advantages, including simplicity in creation and compatibility across devices.

By following ten practical tips outlined in this article, advertisers can maximize the effectiveness of Popunder campaigns. From leveraging competitive intelligence to optimizing landing pages, these strategies offer a clear path to success.

Ultimately, Popunders remain a potent tool for driving targeted traffic and achieving campaign goals in the ever-evolving landscape of digital marketing. And if you experience any issues with them, just drop us a line, HilltopAds will make sure your campaigns run like clockwork.

Ellipse