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Has anyone here received any benefit as a consumer from algorithmic ad targeting?
I always get ads for items I have already purchased and won't need again for years if ever.
I always get ads for items I have already purchased and won't need again for years if ever.
I hate when I search something, buy it, and then get ads for items forever afterward. To be honest, the most egregious targeted ads I get are for baby and child things because I like Disney. I will never be pregnant, and I don't like/want children. I can't wait to be out of the age demographic that gets this kind of advertising.
Likewise. I hate it. I also don't understand why advertisers pay for it. It seems like a scam by the platforms on the advertisers.
Probabyl the same as any other reason. either it works on most people who aren't tech saavy, or it works subtly even on tech saavy people.
Companies don't make car commercials hoping for some rich family to jump out their seat and throw down 100k on a new car the next day. Sometimes brand recognition leads to subtle long term brand trust.
It's still annoying as hell when you have just purchased a refrigerator, or a car or in my case a specific program of graduate study at a university that I have halfway completed and you receive ads specifically for those items.
I hope to never enroll in school again but that doesn't stop the universities from spamming me with their offerings.
It works on more people than you realize. People who stop to think about ads are a minority.
You can’t work in an advertising agency without some degree of willful ignorance or denial. The entire industry exists to convince people to willingly give away their money. That cannot possibly be a net positive for society.
Having done ad work at an ad agency, you're looking at it like they're twiddling their thumbs thinking about how to sucker people out of money when it's really like "A big company wants an ad for Father's Day" and then I get a creative challenge like a chatGPT prompt on how to combine "Coffee, Father's Day, and Big Company's Brand Image."
Really, most of the people at the agency aren't pouring over psychological profiles to manipulate recently mourning mothers, they just get an ask from a client and try to think of ways to fill that.
It's not really a net positive but I could use my talents for much worse... Most jobs these days probably have a similar stats.
That's not at all what I'm saying. Even if you're not involved in the data, you have to be aware of the purpose of the advertisement you are creating. Even if you're only in the creative side, you have to know that the purpose of all media is to get someone to change their mind!
When you have been a parent for a few years, the algorithms start to give you ads for DNA tests and divorce lawyers. It is a bit freaky but I guess they have pretty good data on when people statistically are looking for that kind of thing.
Yeah, I've thankfully never gotten divorce lawyer ads, even though we've been married for a few years now.
It's just really frustrating when you never look it up and they just start targeting you.
As soon as I hit 10 years of marriage I started getting ads for divorce lawyers and dating sites. Sleazy bastards.
I'll have to see if this comes true. I used to get ads for jackets that I could never pull off and wallets (one of which I have actually put on my gift list) in my Google news feed, but this weekend my wife and I spent about 3 hours in Toys/Babies-R-Us looking at crib mattresses and strollers. Now my ads are 100% baby related. I even got an ad for baby-sized designer sunglasses this morning!
Could be a self-fulfilling prophecy in some cases.
My experience has been searching for something, thinking about it, NOT buying it, and then being pressured by ads forever after! I experienced this with an exercise program thing. The pressure did work - I eventually bought it, but thankfully I am benefiting from it because I'm actually exercising. (But the reason I didn't buy it before now was that I couldn't exercise, so... it wouldn't have made sense to buy it OR for ads to rub it in my face if they put together my search history lol.)
I get not being able to exercise! I'm a chronic pain patient, and I've recently been diagnosed with fibromyalgia.
I'm only now starting to be able to exercise. What program are you using, if you don't mind sharing?
It's The Conqueror, which is basically a virtual challenge where they send you fun virtual rewards as you log miles (you can convert timed exercises) and you get a physical medal in the mail when you complete a challenge. They're all themed and most of them seem to follow real paths, which I find pretty cool.
My wife and I recently completed all of the Lord of the Rings medals from them and they're super cool! Really well detailed and even comes with the One Ring.
My first set of challenges is the LotR bundle! Really looking forward to getting that first medal.
I've seen ads for that, but not very often anymore. I saw them a lot when I registered my husband for the RunDisney race in Disneyland.
My girlfriend has bought several articles of clothing from those types of targeted ads, and she has backed a ridiculous amount of board games on kickstarter because of similar ads. I guess targeted ads work best on items where having duplicates with slight variations is acceptable. However, it doesn't help that they try the same thing with vaccuum cleaners or televisions. I don't need another refrigerator since I just bought one, thanks, Amazon.
The classic one for me is when Amazon starts recommending you something more after you purchase it.
No, Amazon, I don't think I'm going to splurge on a second or third toilet seat-- thanks, though.
They wouldn't do it if it didn't work. I guess it's probably because people who just bought something are clearly interested in owning that product but are likely to have some issue with it and swap it out for a different model.
A lot of the time I think we just don't notice relevant ads targeting us specifically, because they're not something you notice.
What we do notice is every time it goes wrong, and we get ads for hot tubs, or beds or whatever high-profit item for a decade or more, everywhere.
Examples og good algorithmic targeted ads:
To me what really sucks are getting the same ads in huge volumes for things that aren't at all relevant to me. No, I'm not buying a car. No, I'm definitely not buying a car because I bought one previously. No, I'm never going to McDonalds or Burger King and I'm not going to buy soda just because I get ads for a specific brand everywhere.
Sure, relevant ads may lead some to buy more of things than they had planned or should, but many people make bad choices when they go to the store, or just going shopping based on their financial needs too.
Yes, there's too much pressure to buy stuff. I think the worst kind of ads are related to food and servings and expectations relating to diet. The food advertising and trends are killing us on a societal level, one obesity/overnutrition death at a time.
Yes, I think. But only on specific platforms. I read the NYT on their app everyday, and when I was planning a train trip for some family, I saw ads for some scenic train routes/packages. I want able to incorporate them, but bookmarked the site for future trips.
I've noticed that it is the more niche platforms, or platforms with a barrier to entry that have the potential for useful ads. I suspect it is also a more curated presentation of ads.
I don't see useful ads on Google, YouTube, Amazon, etc.
For most non-routine purchases, I'm the opposite of an impulsive shopper. Sometimes I enjoy doing the research about products, and sometimes it's more of a compulsion. And if there's no hard deadline for when I need a product, sometimes I get stalled at the research/decision-making stage and just forget about the whole thing for days/weeks. When I see a targeted ad reminding me of that product, it's genuinely helpful to remind me to pick up that thread again.
The thing is, I have a general aversion to ads (and an intuitive heuristic that the more a company has to advertise, the worse their product is), so I tend to not buy whichever brand's ad I saw. But seeing the ad can have the effect of reminding me to make a purchase.
Sort of, but not as a consumer. I tend to get advertisements for my competitors, which is "useful" as it kept me informed in realtime as to what they are doing -- but it's not useful for the advertisers or intermediaries since I'm definitely not going to buy their services. However, like you said, I keep getting those ads even though I've been out of those lines of business for years now, so they're no longer even useful to me.
My instagram ads are pretty good, clearly the algorithm has figured me out. I don’t think I’ve ever bought anything directly from one but it has made me aware of brands which I have then bought from.
My Instagram ads are sometimes helpful. But most of the time it's for men's ED drugs, sneakers, and hair removers for down under (usually shown on a super hairy peach). I don't need these things...yet.
Rarely. Kickstarter is probably the main one where it helps limit things to my somewhat esoteric tastes and stops me from having to browse endlessly or keep an eye on things.
Outside of that it's much much less useful, but I also think that's because they're low effort implementations and on sites on like amazon I basically don't trust them for shit. I suppose it's worth mentioning there's probably been times where an amazon rec has led me to doing research, which led me to buying a product directly from a vendor that was similar to the recommendation, although I'm sure amazon isn't happy about that.
Over the years, I've gender-bent Amazon's systems to the point that I can get recommendations for sports bras, industrial data loggers, Chinese black vinegar, Carhartt pants, darning looms, power tools, and cat toys all in the same day. I'd rather I wasn't so well tracked, but all of those things are relevant to my interests.
Kickstarter - fall for one scam, and you'll get a ridiculous number of other scammers in your recommendations. Or maybe that's just the Chinese consumer electronic gadgets market.
I run a plethora of ad blocking tools everywhere. If I sit down at my spouse's computer, it still shocks me how ad-spammy and awful his browser windows are. He's getting ads that track him right down to the shoe size and shirt collar measurement. [TBH, I want to know how New York Times e-mail newsletters are targeting their inline ads. Bastards have tracked my bra size and health conditions, and that ain't cool.]
Amazon knows I've never purchased a piece of clothing from their website. They know exactly what I've bought on there. Solder wick, RC car parts, etc, etc...
What do they ask me about? Tennis skirts, high heels, motor oil and garage organizers. I have no idea what I clicked on to get hitched to that algorithm for the last few years but we'll see how long it lasts.
Already done (and repeated annually), also using Consumer Reports Permission Slip app to clean up as much as possible from individual vendors. Once the data is out there, it's anyone's guess who'll aggregate it.
Yes but not in the way I think you're asking the question. I've benefitted from countless websites who can only exist with the money that comes from them running ads, and targetted ads are worth more than blind ones (although most people I still know in the industry agree that most targetting really isn't that useful anyway, but don't tell Googface!)
In another way I have benefitted by convincing Meta that I am interested in buying underwear so now most of the ads I get on FB/IG are pictures of people in their underwear, which brightens up my feed if nothing else. I don't think I've ever actually bought any underwear. Because I keep FB containerised it has no other tracking information than the ads I've clicked on, so it's easy to keep it on-track should it wander back into trying to sell me 5G Blocking Keyrings. 15 years of regular FB use and still they know nothing about me. I don't know why anyone worries about "their data" when it's so transparently worthless.
Amazon's "people who bought X also looked at/bought Y" things are useful sometimes when I'm looking for something fairly generic and want to see the various options available.
There’s a huge difference between targeted ads and personalized ads, though. Ads could very easily be targeted based on the content on the page and the people likely to visit it.
Come to think of it I don’t think I have ever heard any data about personalized ads being more expensive than otherwise targeted ads. They may actually be less expensive overall because they pull from smaller pools of people. I would imagine the answer is going to be fairly opaque because it would depend on myriad variables.
I would have to take a good, hard look at the perception of “benefit” to answer this but I can say that I have bought items as a result of targeted marketing that I am happy with.
The biggest issue for me is that I have no way of knowing what I’m trading for those benefits (or, more accurately, conveniences). For every perceived benefit, I can think of thousands of ways that I would be harmed or inconvenienced. For example, if I bought 2 of the items that I found through targeted ads, is that worth me getting bombarded by ads everywhere, even with an ad-blocker? As someone that values their time more than anything, I’m not sure if the time spent watching parts of ads on YouTube (the ad-blocking isn’t perfect no matter what anyone claims) and Hulu was worth the convenience of me being presented with ads just as I was shopping for a Roomba.
Directly - I suppose never. Usually if I see some interesting item in an ad I will search for it and then (after reading reviews) will buy it from different, but convenient for me vendor. I have this feeling that all ads from companies that I`m not familiar with are all scams. Not sure why I have this feeling tho.
I've gotten a few articles of clothing and backed two games on kickstarter due to targeted ads. I always feel a little guilty when I purchase something through that means because I know I'm just feeding into the algorithm, but oh well.
I've found niche Etsy sellers via their algorithmic recommendations on the front page, overall a positive experience. But that's not like, advertising on other sites, I only see it if I go specifically to Etsy.
There was a period of a year or two when Google ads were relevant to your search (rather than based on tracking users around the web) and SEO wasn't abused yet, so ads were often exactly what you wanted at the moment. That's been gone for a while, though.
I would recommend to anyone to opt out of as many ad personalization schemes as they can and then to cut out any brand that you see ads for. Those ads tend to be the “spend a ton to get the most reach” types, and if they are spending a lot on ads their products or services are being priced high enough to afford it. So if you are buying it you are paying more for the luxury of being forced to hear more about it all the time. It’s an endless cycle of suckitude.
Targeted ads are really not much better, TBH.
I think the honest answer for me is very rarely, but not never. I think that's basically the whole idea of the system though. Sure, very often I'll see a remarketed ad for something I've already bought or don't intend to buy in the first place. I don't necessarily find that annoying, because I'm not super invested in the content of ads anyway. Yes, they're technically "wrong" in that I'm not interested in that thing, but if I think about it at least the publisher is making very, very slightly more money from that ad view.
And then in a very small number of cases, I have genuinely been reminded of something I was interested in purchasing and ended up following through, or learned about the existence of a product I then purchased through targeted ads.
I think that's the business model though. Those ads maybe have a hit rate of 1/1000 or 1/10000, but they tend to be more effective than non-targeted ads and so they're still valuable.
I run network-wide adblockers at home, with pretty strict blocking for trackers as well. On the go, I have a nextDNS profile installed on my phone with similar block lists. As a result, I feel like “targeted” ads that do make it through really aren’t that targeted, with a couple of notable exceptions.
I have an Instagram account that I use to follow a handful of creators and local news accounts (under 50 total accounts). I have zero followers and only check in every now and then. My Facebook account is deactivated and not linked to the IG account. The ad algo there has nailed me. I’ve purchased a few items I saw in ads that piqued my interest (although I’m careful to not purchase through the ads themselves). TikTok’s ad algorithm is all over the place with me, but the content algorithm is pretty accurate overall.
I was interested in bare foot shoes for a while.
I watched many YouTube videos about it. My guess is that is how an ad for an affordable starter pair showed up in my Facebook feed.
I get those bare foot shoe ads all the time. Ive never searched them or wanted them. Stop it.
No.
Now I will send even more of them to you. :-)
I'm a man. I like looking at nicely dressed woman. I like to buy my wife lingerie. So I have a look at eshop with nice underwear here and there.
All I see are beutiful women dressed in beautiful underwear on my personal targeted ads. Win-win!
Nope. I do everything I can to stop tracking as much as I can, I block ads wherever it's feasible, and I get angry at the represented brands when they get through. I will go out of my way to only buy from competitors if the occurrence was memorable enough.
I still won't buy Febreze products, nearly a decade later, because back before I paid for Spotify Premium, they had a particularly obnoxious ad that kept coming up.
ah, a fellow "now i won't buy your thing out of sheer spite" enjoyer. I too have ad blockers everywhere, but if something slips through, even if it's something i'm genuinely interested in, it's forever blacklisted bc i'm so mad about being advertised at.
Just so you know, you're a demographic. Advertisers know about you and how to sell to you.
Also the "well now I won't buy x" rarely works because that's not how human brains generally work. Unless you consciously maintain an actual list of brands to avoid and check it before buying stuff, you're more likely to buy the brands you've seen before. iirc, getting mad about it actually increases subconscious recognition later.