King C Posted February 21, 2010 Report Share Posted February 21, 2010 Last night I was merely browsing the internet for some trainers, a couple of tees and a few hoodies. I basically decided on what I wanted and shopped around, typing specific items into google. Now today, whilst checking my e-mails and on the top of the 4od website, I see the trainers I was looking at and some of the tops etc being advertised. The specific items were scrolling across with prices and colours next to them. Just wondering if anyone else noticed this or maybe it was a massive coincidennce. Although, it was on two different websites and one was advertising the shoes, the other, the tops, so Im thinking maybe not coincidence. Meh, discuss or ignore. Up to you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomm Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 There's loads of information that any random website can tell about you, from your browsing history, or cookies or something. If you go on this website (which appears to be down right now) you get a list of the past 40 websites you've been on. Kinda scary really. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
konstant Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 There's nothing particularly new about this tech... a cookie stored on your machine identifies you as the person who looked for trainers and the domain that first provided the cookie is then able to read it again to identify you and sell you trainers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeanuckleJive Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 Yeah, this has been going on for years, myspace was the first place I saw it If you mentioned that you like a band on your profile and really like to eat biscuits, the ads you see would all be about metallica tickets and rich teas Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anzo Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 It's a pretty disgusting method of advertising - where does it draw the line at invasion of your online privacy? Gmail for example is well known for placing adverts relating to your emails - I use my gmail account mainly for job applications, and so I usually get a lot of broswer adverts for job search sites. This means that Google are filtering keywords in my personal emails to help advertising 'appropriate' products. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MadManMike Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 Facebook is the worst, it uses your profile info to spam you. "Are you 25, in a relationship and interested in music?" You know I f**king am, you just leeched that info straight off my page! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JD™ Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 Why is it bad to have adverts that are targetted to you and your interests/circumstances? I ask this as someone interested, because my livlihood depends on it. Yes the advertisers get to choose who they target, but they don't get any information from you personally unless you give it to them. Google/Facebook never tell thejobsite.co.uk that you have job related emails in your inbox - only you and Google know that, and why would Google give a f**k? What they are doing is better serving you, the visitor, by putting options in front of you that are relevant. Would you rather browse the internet and have adverts for commodes and tampons or for things that you actually might want to buy? Advertising is a necessary 'evil' so it might as well be tailored to you, right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anzo Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 Why is it bad to have adverts that are targetted to you and your interests/circumstances? Of course I'd rather have relevent adverts - the same as in if I buy a bike magazine I'll see bikes and bike shops advertised, I have no problem with that. However, I wonder where the line is drawn on market research and invasion of my privacy. I wasn't aware (although it must be in the T&C somewhere) that I gave permission for google to use my emails for advertising purposes. I don't like the idea that my internet habbits are distributed to anyone other than my ISP. I understand Google is a free service, and we can expect adverts on it, but I just don't agree with the method used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JD™ Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 I do understand that, and I can see this is going to be an interesting thread for me to get an insight into the thoughts of a consumer. My reasons for thinking that those points are maybe a bit over paranoid are: No-one is in control of the data used except you - if you don't want an email to be searched on then save it to disk and delete itAt no point is a person in posession of your data, it's just an algorithm at the end of the day [if email contains 'snowboarding' then display snowboard advert] not [if email contains 'snowboarding' display snowboard advert and inform snowboarding retailers that you've visited the bnp website recently] Your info is never passed to the retailers/brands/whatever, it is just used by the host service (which, if you don't trust it don't use it) to decide which ads to serve you. Anything more than that is a data protection infringement and that company is breaking the law just like anyone going through your bin and getting your bank details. Likewise, only information which you have decided to put on the internet can be actioned and only by those you give permission to, whether by signing up or explicitly giving that permission. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam-Griffin Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 I don't know what you're all complaining about, If it wasn't for internet advertising I wouldn't be meeting a hot young babe in my area this weekend! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anzo Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 No-one is in control of the data used except you - if you don't want an email to be searched on then save it to disk and delete itAt no point is a person in posession of your data, it's just an algorithm at the end of the day [if email contains 'snowboarding' then display snowboard advert] not [if email contains 'snowboarding' display snowboard advert and inform snowboarding retailers that you've visited the bnp website recently] Your info is never passed to the retailers/brands/whatever, it is just used by the host service (which, if you don't trust it don't use it) to decide which ads to serve you. Anything more than that is a data protection infringement and that company is breaking the law just like anyone going through your bin and getting your bank details. Likewise, only information which you have decided to put on the internet can be actioned and only by those you give permission to, whether by signing up or explicitly giving that permission. I understand they're being scanned by a computer, not a person - so effectively it's the same as my mail being scanned by an anti-spam filter. I have no immensely personal emails in there that would break me if they were let loose, but the point still stands that I see it as invasion of privacy. I know all about data protection, however thats a law, it doesn't mean to say that people stick to it...BBC, NHS, Google, Yahoo are examples of peoples data going 'missing' and appearing on the net. Personally, I've never benefited from the advertising within Gmail, so I couldn't care less what it says, I still wouldn't click it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JD™ Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 I understand they're being scanned by a computer, not a person - so effectively it's the same as my mail being scanned by an anti-spam filter. I have no immensely personal emails in there that would break me if they were let loose, but the point still stands that I see it as invasion of privacy. I know all about data protection, however thats a law, it doesn't mean to say that people stick to it...BBC, NHS, Google, Yahoo are examples of peoples data going 'missing' and appearing on the net. Personally, I've never benefited from the advertising within Gmail, so I couldn't care less what it says, I still wouldn't click it. Yea, I'm totally not having a go or anything - if I seemed a bit pushy about it then it's literally because I'd just sat in a meeting about just how we can target ads served on our own sites a bit more effectively for 3 hours. Brain. Fried. The way I see it is that technology has to be trusted. Yes, some people will misuse it and yes sometimes there will be freak f**k ups, but unless we want to live in the dark ages we'll have to deal with that. The car is a completely fallible piece of technology and yet millions of people trust their lives in them each and every day - the same is true of many technologies. Advertisers and those serving adverts are becoming more savvy because they know that people are choice rich and time poor, a message needs to be concise and relevant for it to not fade into the background. The time of flashing green and blue banner ads trying to distract you from your web experience is gone, advertisers are being smarter about carefully putting a message in front of you that you should be interested it - it's time for consumers to put more trust in those and click them more often If anyone feels like clicking on all the ads on mpora.com as often as possible then that would be lovely lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anzo Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 The way I see it is that technology has to be trusted. Yes, some people will misuse it and yes sometimes there will be freak f**k ups, but unless we want to live in the dark ages we'll have to deal with that. The car is a completely fallible piece of technology and yet millions of people trust their lives in them each and every day - the same is true of many technologies. Advertisers and those serving adverts are becoming more savvy because they know that people are choice rich and time poor, a message needs to be concise and relevant for it to not fade into the background. The time of flashing green and blue banner ads trying to distract you from your web experience is gone, advertisers are being smarter about carefully putting a message in front of you that you should be interested it - it's time for consumers to put more trust in those and click them more often Although that's a visual trust. You see a car, you can inspect it and know when something doesn't feel right. Data is invisable - I'd hate to think how much data is stored about me and the activities I'm involved with, and also how easily it would be to access that information. For as long as there is technology, there will be a security issue. Perhaps I am a little more careful with my data as I have 'accidently' accessed other peoples data that they thought was hidden on a trusted resource many times. Although it was a small server, the principle is still the same. I appreciate your knowledge in the field of advertising! I'd like some stats regarding the success of internet advertising (i.e. how often does a click result in a sale - roughly?) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JD™ Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 I appreciate your knowledge in the field of advertising! I'd like some stats regarding the success of internet advertising (i.e. how often does a click result in a sale - roughly?) Likewise with yours in IT, I'm definitely not naive to the fact that a lot of security isn't really all that secure - like a bike lock just through a front wheel. Stats wise, industry averages say that a click through rate of 0.01% (yep, a hundredth of a percent or once every 10,000 times the ad is seen) is acceptable, with anything above being good for traditional web ad placements (banners, buttons, MPUs etc). Once that click is through to a retailer the percentages completely rely on them - my job is to get people onto their site and whether they convert them into sales is down to how well they do their job. This is frustrating at times when you know that they aren't converting the business you're putting in front of them and then getting blamed for it! Some people will convert 10% of what you give them, others will be lucky to get 1%. It's down to the product and the service. Untraditional and more unique ads (interactive banners, pre and post rolls on videos, in stream ads etc) can see averages of 6% click through (or 600 times more effective) which is why it's all about targetting the message and the places that the ad appears. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Revolver Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 I don't know what you're all complaining about, If it wasn't for internet advertising I wouldn't be meeting a hot young babe in my area this weekend! Weird how they seem to be able to talk to you on MSN when MSN isn't actually open though... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LukasMcNeal Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 The ads are good, I got ripped in 4 weeks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobinJI Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 Untraditional and more unique ads (interactive banners, pre and post rolls on videos, in stream ads etc) can see averages of 6% click through (or 600 times more effective) which is why it's all about targetting the message and the places that the ad appears. I always click on the adds on 4od, not because I want to, but because on BBC I-player you have to click in the video's image to get the controls at the bottom to hide (don't think you're meant to have to, but I do anyway), so I forget which I'm on and click the screen to try and hide the controls, resulting in the video stopping and me getting directed to some irrelevant crap. haha. . I guess with the targeted adds it's kinda comparable to valet parking, you trust them to park your car and not go for a joy ride/steel your shit. The only thing I don't like about it is that I can choose not to valet park, I can't really choose not to have targeted adds. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
l33th3tr33 Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 The ads are good, I got ripped in 4 weeks! sucker. i got ripped in 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeanuckleJive Posted February 23, 2010 Report Share Posted February 23, 2010 Facebook is the worst, it uses your profile info to spam you. "Are you 25, in a relationship and interested in music?" You know I f**king am, you just leeched that info straight off my page! I'm changing my interests to raping and pillaging, gonna see if I can get me some adverts for viking lessons Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prawny Baby Posted February 23, 2010 Report Share Posted February 23, 2010 Facebook seems to feed off history too, all my facebook ads are car related stuff, which could be related to the car stuff posted on my wall, but a mate of mine has a GSXR750, and visits a few bike forums, but has never mentioned it on FB at all, yet his FB ads are often bike related..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Davetrials Posted February 23, 2010 Report Share Posted February 23, 2010 My facebook ads try and sell me drugs lol, i dont go on drug related websites haha Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anzo Posted February 26, 2010 Report Share Posted February 26, 2010 Blimey. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Simpson Posted February 26, 2010 Report Share Posted February 26, 2010 Is this why I keep getting adverts about child pornography? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MadManMike Posted February 26, 2010 Report Share Posted February 26, 2010 Blimey. Yeah I had something similar. Fan of Lance Armstrong so it suggests Jeremy Clarkson O....K.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JD™ Posted February 26, 2010 Report Share Posted February 26, 2010 (edited) Yeah I had something similar. Fan of Lance Armstrong so it suggests Jeremy Clarkson O....K.... Yea it's doing this not based on the similarities of those people though. It's doing it on whether a certain percentage of people who are fans of LA are fans of JC. I reckon that with the amount of people like JxM on facebook who just seem to join EVERYTHING ON FACEBOOK, you're bound to get weird things like that happen. They really need to figure out a better way of doing it, or not do it at all. Edited February 26, 2010 by JD™ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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