You know how annoying it is, right? When you’re trying to click a button at the bottom edge of an app’s navigation, and your fat fingers accidentally click an poorly placed mobile ad instead?

Sometimes, it’s almost impossible to click on the actual nav button without clicking the ad…

If you’ve done this, on a tablet or smartphone, Google has your back. They’ve introduce a new “confirmed click” functionality that sort of double-checks your intent to make sure you want to navigate away from the site/app you’re currently viewing.

“Today, we’re introducing confirmed clicks into all in-app image ad banners on smartphones, which reduces accidental clicks by prompting the user to confirm that they intended to click on the ad.” – The Google Mobile Ads Blog

Look, mobile ads can be effective (some would say very effective) but nobody appreciates errant clicks… no one should, at least.

Advertisers definitely don’t want to pay for the BS impressions. These are perhaps the lowest quality clicks imaginable — more expensive than pop-ups, but even less effective.

Some marketers might think that sneaky little ads that cause you to click accidentally are clever, but the truth is that they’re fooling themselves. Mis-clicks artificially lower your EPCs, screwing up your analytics, which is a huge problem.

Of course, it’s critical that all advertisers watch their analytics data like a hawk. But it just as important for publishers. You think I’m kidding, but I’m not…

If you currently sell ads on your site, or you ever plan to in the future — this data is the all-important basis for your rates. That means, you not only need to know what your banner CTRs are, but you need to know how to manage them.

The more data you’re willing to sift through, as a publisher, the better you can understand your readers and how to deliver a quality experience for them…