I was just reading a story about how Taboola Ltd.’s deal to acquire Outbrain Inc. has been called off, putting an end to an attempt to combine the internet’s two largest content-recommendation companies.
Taboola and Outbrain are known for generating the “promoted stories” or “around the web” sections that appear at the bottom of news stories on various websites. The links are often advertisements crafted to resemble news stories.
Taboola and Outbrain, which dominate their industry, pay publishers for the right to have a feed of third-party content featured at the bottom of news stories. Both personalize their recommendations based on users’ browsing history.
They in turn are paid by the groups whose items they promote, which are often clickbait-style slideshows designed to be hard for readers to resist.
One of the first thoughts that came into my mind – I wonder if there is a web site that might list some of the best clickbait headlines of all time, and Ranker came to the rescue once again.
Here are some of my favorite of the top-ranked (i.e., worst) clickbait headlines. None of these are clickable, you can thank me in the comments 🙂
oola, Outbrain
Admit it, there were some of those you wish you could click on.
I think that would be a fun job; coming up with a headline and an image that somebody just couldn’t resist clicking on.
It’s the ultimate Internet challenge, and who doesn’t like a good challenge?
And who wouldn’t want to cut their grocery bill by 90%
Borden's Blather 
There’s always a hustle going on. I usually can resist click-bait, but must admit that occasionally the bastards hook me.
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that would be the fun/challenge, tripping up someone like you who does not usually get tripped up…
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I think it might be like working for the National Enquirer.
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writing click bait headlines for the National Enquirer – sounds like my dream job! 🙂
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Perhaps a good retirement job?
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and I probably could do it from home…
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Oooh I know you wanted to click on the one about ducks! After all, you feel pretty close to them, don’t you? 🙂
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Quack!
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LOL!
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I’m don’t think I’m the target audience for click-bait. I don’t find most of the headlines that interesting. About the only one I was curious about was the paycheck for the McDonald’s worker.
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it only takes one to hook you in 🙂
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I’m definitely not a clickbait target I am a salesman’s nightmare …
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there’s always one in the crowd 🙂
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Yup and thats me!
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i have to admit, i’ve been drawn into them before, but am always disappointed and regret it immediately
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I wonder if the click bait people consider it a success when people have that sense of regret… 🙂
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I usually resist, but then… baby ducks. Sigh. (So glad the links weren’t clickable!)
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I’m sure baby animals are a popular click bait image… 🙂
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Your click-bait headline drew me here. 😁
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that’s what I was hoping for 🙂
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Ugh, click baits…I hate it when I get sucked into one of those, and like Beth, I immediately regret it. Not so much of a problem now, but when they started with this crap, we were still innocent and didn’t know better.
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Sometimes they might actually write about something I am interested in, but I hate it when it is a list of 20 or so items, and you have to keep clicking one entry at a time to move forward…
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I know the answer to the last one: buy 90% less grocery shopping 😉
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or at least cut out 90% of the junk food 🙂
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I have my groceries delivered – if I did that there’d be nothing left for them to bring 😂
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same here; right after I sent that; I realized junk food is probably most of my grocery bill 🙂
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As it probably is for lots of people. Chocolate and cake don’t count, do they?
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if it’s vegan, it’s all good 🙂
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Think you misspelled ‘boring’ 😉
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🙂
that’s usually how I justify buying junk food – if it’s vegan, it can’t be that bad for me…
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I like the one that says “you will never want to eat again.” Yeah, right. I admit to trying these scams every once in a while even though I know they are probably a waste of time.
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I think we’ve all been sucked in, and yes, the odds are we will be disappointed…
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These types of headlines irritate me no end.
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Yes, they are quite annoying, especially when they entice us to click on it, and we end up disappointed…
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Oh yes, my curious mind has been sucked in before, but I have learned! I don’t have the patience to keep reading when they are talking about everything else besides the headline!
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yes, that is part of the frustration, when you have to read and read and read to get to what the headline was about…
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And then when you click on these they have like one sentence per page and you have to keep clicking to the next page only for the stupidest ending ever…
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yes, that is the worse…
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‘You won’t believe what happened next…’
At least no ‘Supercally…’! Cheers jim
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that’s a tough headline to beat…
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That stuff is rampant on Facebook, lol. No, I’m never tempted. 🙂
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click bait is every where…
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Very true, but an absurd amount of it on FB 😉
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