Read this post! You won’t believe what happens next! It could save your life! Ten Things You Can’t Afford NOT to Know! Click bait is the eye candy of the internet. I know, I know, you thought I was, but for the purposes of today’s Phil Factor we’ll say click bait is the eye candy of the internet. A title or picture so tantalizing that we can’t resist clicking on it. That’s my quandary every weekend when I write #ThePhilFactor. I think to myself, What’s a title catchy enough that people will click on it? The one I finally settled on today was my fifth idea. I’m not out to ruin your life, I just want three or four minutes of your time and a comment or like so that my ego remains intact for another day. As far as click bait goes, my blog is incredibly benign.
Not all click bait is benign. Most is designed to suck you into to clicking so that you can be shown pop-up ads that leave cookies on your computer so they can show you pop-up ads no matter what web page you’re on. Cookies that will show you targeted ads. Normally I love cookies. Nutter Butters are my favorite. Wouldn’t it be great if they could plant real cookies in your computer when you click on an ad? If I click on “Ten Earth Shattering Reasons Why The Kardashians Want To Date You” and a Nutter Butter cookie pops out of my CD drive you bet I’d be hooked! When I’m elected President, or Sexiest Man Alive, I’m going to pass a law mandating that that’s how click bait should work. With the new 3-D printers, there’s no reason I can’t get a cookie every time I click on an ad.
Sadly that’s not the kind of cookie you get when you click click bait. You see an article that says “The Twenty Most Attractive People of All Time”. You’re curious, you click it to see if I made the list. First page there’s a picture of Taylor Swift. (By the way, the other day Justin Bieber covered a Taylor Swift tune in concert and she is pissed about it. Read more here.) Underneath the first picture is an arrow that says See More —> and you have to click it to see number two. And that goes on and on for an hour until you get through, all the while clicking off the pop up ads that promise to help you look 20 years younger. If I’m 25, I’m pretty sure I’d have no interest in looking 20 years younger. That’s just creepy. Then when you get to the interminable end of your list of the twenty most attractive people of all time (spoiler alert, I’m no. 8) you see a caption and picture that says Do This Exercise 5 Minutes A Day and You’ll …live forever, look younger, attract others, lose weight etc. And you figure, “I can exercise 5 minutes a day” so…
We all have our favorite click bait. There’s just some topics or titles we would love to be true and can’t resist. Some of us love celebrity news, others like time savers, I like fitness stuff, some fall for lists. In the comments, tell me what is your irresistible click bait, besides The Phil Factor. Also, if you want to be an ironic hipster and make The Phil Factor click bait just hit the Facebook or Twitter share buttons below. Have a great Saturday! ~Phil
The best kind of clickbait is when the photo they use to tempt you to click isn’t actually included in the list of 20 most beautiful politicians after all and you’ve wasted your time even more than you expected to. Errrr….so I’m told.
LOL!
I hate click bait too. To find out why go to Steve-says.net 🙂
LOL!
Fake deaths, loss of dramatic weight
Always gets me on click bait.
I love to look at the click bait features. Not click just look. The ones I really like are the “He left us to (yes that is how it reads) soon”
I don’t think I’d click on a “He left us too soon.” For me sad stuff is anti- click bait
Five foods never to eat to lose belly fat. I still don’t know. The presentations go on and on with cute cartoons and a sale of something. Then, how to get rid of Wrinkles! It never ends.
I know! If they ever paid off on half the promises the titles make they’d be worth it.
Give me one tip and I’d be happy!
Awesome title, I gotta say — great post, too! 🙂
Thanks Joey!