Adverts

[BradleySmith]

Hi,

I'm more than a little annoyed to see adverts when I launch my paid version of Parallels. Is there a way to permanently turn this off? Every time a new ad appears I check the "Don't show this again" box but it appears that only refers to the current advert. It's not right to advertise to me inside a paid for product. Might seem trivial but it's highly annoying. Anyone know how to stop it?

Thanks
Brad

[YanaYana]

Answered in private

[PaulPJB]

I too find this incredibly infuriating given that we purchased a fully paid version, you routinely have to pay upgrade fees to keep the software working on newer versions of Mac OS, so ads that pop-up, particularly for 3rd party apps are uncool and infuriating.

Please help me turn off all ads on Parallels, forever... that includes the upgrade ads. If I feel the need to upgrade I will. If you have a new product, I'll get an email about it or read about it in TUAW.

[YanaYana]

Answered in private

[Nick1105]

May I have the private email on disabling adverts too?

I am a paying customer, owning both Parallels 6 and Parallels 7.

[DarrenPeace]

I would also like to know how to remove these adverts; I use Parallels to demonstrate Windows configurations to clients, and it is really quite embarrassing that I have to negotiate this sort of thing, to the extent that I sometimes use VMWare Fusion for these demos.

Darren
UK

[YanaYana]

Answered in private

[JohnNN]

I just started up my VM on my fully paid Parallels 7 and I received one of these ads. I'm here to find out how to disable them permanently, but apparently that is knowledge you don't want to share publicly?

Please forward to me the private secret info, or better yet post it here so your paying customers have access to it without excess hassle.

[m00nchild]

I've been a parallels paying user since VERSION 3 and constantly receive pop up ads for upgrades and third party tools. Every time I check the check box for the madness and intrusion to stop and it just doesn't stop. Make it stop please. I'm a customer. I'm already a qualified lead who converted and upgrades when I'm ready because the product provides what I need.

Parallels doesn't need to constantly remind me about what I already have, know or want from you. The more you spam me the more likely I'm to get frustrated and explore alternatives. BKeep me satisfied and loyal by letting me use and enjoy the product I paid for with feeling harassed.

[YanaYana]

answers provided

[m00nchild]

I received no answers. Where were they provided?

[RoccoC]

I too have this annoying issue!!

Why is the answer private?!

[AKostur]

I am another rather annoyed customer (I got one this morning.). Why am I being pushed very intrusive pop-up advertisements on a purchased licensed product? Based on other replies in this thread, it seems that there is a way to disable them but for some reason this method is being kept private. Receiving these ads should be _opt-in_, not _opt-out_. This is not encouraging me to recommend Parallels for any of our other corporate Macs.

[platpt78]

How about you post the answer in this thread so we can have an open discussion about it.
Sneaky tactics via these intrusive advertising techniques.

If you want to display these software options when first installing parallels, that's not too bad, but if I have to see a new upgrade popup every few days, get out of here. this ESPECIALLY applies to trying to upsell your own product, tell me when a new version is available ONCE, and if I choose not to upgrade, don't pester me every week after that with your spammy looking "deals".

Name one other piece of paid software that does this dodgy, scheming advertising...

[Deep Thought]

I also would like to get the super secret instructions for turning off the ads.
Thanks

[AdamWi]

Same here. I really like using Parallels, but the popup ads have to stop or I will not be upgrading again. Loyal user since V5 (I even had a feature written up about me on the Parallels blog a few while back). Please let me know how to disable them.

[YanaYana]

We use in-product notifications to share several types of information with our customers. First, and most importantly, we share information about product updates which are generally related to compatibility with OS X, new features and product enhancements. Second, we occasionally share special offers from Parallels or other third party companies who provide special deals for our customers. Many of our customers rely on the information about product updates and appreciate the special deals for products that are of interest to them.

Individual notifications can be turned off by clicking the “don’t show this again” button. However, because customers need to receive important product information, there is not a mechanism for customers to completely disable notifications.

Thank you for sharing your opinion. At times, Parallels staff may remove or edit posts that contain product code information which changes the general nature of the product, as it may affect the overall performance of the software.

[AKostur]

Wow. Marketing-speak. Product updates appear to be done through a different notification mechanism already ("Product version xxx is now available. Do you wish to install now or later?"), and even has a separate control to modify if and when that check is done.

Whether or not "many of your customers" rely on the information, it would be _trivial_ to put a checkbox in the preferences to TURN THAT OFF. Forget individual notifications. I DO NOT WANT _ANY_ OF THESE "SPECIAL DEALS". EVER. If I want them, I'll sign up for a separate email marketing list. Let me rephrase slightly. It would be trivial to put a checkbox in the preferences to turn it on. The default should be off. Anything else would be showing contempt for your _paying customers_. I most certainly did not buy Parallels to get even more advertising shoved down my throat. This is definitely affecting my decision as to what we should be using corporately for our virtualization needs. None of VMware, Xen, Hyper-V, or VirtualBox have tried to shovel ads at me.

[AdamWi]

Thank you Yana Yana for the reply. I hope that you can appreciate that at least SOME of your customers feel that these unsolicited pop-up advertising messages are intrusive, obnoxious, unprofessional, and downright sleazy. I do not want them on my machine under any circumstances. At this point, there is only one definitive way to prevent them from appearing and that is to stop using Parallels. Unless there is a reversal of this behavior, I'll be moving to another virtualization solution at the next update cycle.

[PaulSh]

I find this annoying too. Please send instructions on how to permanently remove. Thanks.