I have noticed lately that the commercials I see on tv are directly correlated to my internet searches. A few examples:
-Lately I’ve been searching for new furniture for the family room & have noticed a huge uptick in advertisements for furniture stores.
-I’ve also been doing a lot of searches for sports bras with zippers and just this morning saw 2 commercials for sports bras with zippers.
-In my thread about my dog being a sloppy drinker, someone linked me to a site called “Chewy” and I’ve been online shopping there. Now I’m seeing commercials for chewy.com…a company I had never heard of before that thread.
There is an ad at the bottom of my screen right now for chewy.com & I understand how my computer knows that I’ve searched for that. But how does my TV know what I’m searching for on the internet?
Is this just my imagination or is this targeted advertising? I do use the same provider-Verizon (now Frontier) for phone, internet, & tv, so the only thing I can think of is that somehow they keep track of what I search for and play ads on tv that they think will appeal to me. Does anyone know how this works or is this just a case of selective perception?
Selective perception. Of course you’ll notice ads for whatever you’re looking for. Even a combined cable/phone/internet provider doesn’t have the technology yet to drop in home-specific ads on a regular cable channel (it might, maybe be technically possible on a pay per view or on-demand setup.)
The time to be concerned is when your TV starts addressing you directly. “Enola, come closer. I want to tell you something privately.”
No it’s a Sony and FWIW I only notice this on CNN. I’m a news junkie and have it on all day and it seems like every ad I see is for something I’ve done internet research on. I do not notice this on other channels.
I’ve been googling this cause it’s really giving me the creeps and think I got to the bottom of it.
In the article from 2014, it said that Ted Turner (among others) wanted to compete with google and facebook with targeted advertising, so that makes sense why I see these on CNN but not (yet) on other networks.
This feels like a major invasion of privacy. I might have to switch to Fox :eek:
Even if ads that are appearing on your TV are being targeted based on your web browsing history, it’s almost undoubtedly not the cable network you’re watching (CNN or whatever) who’s doing the targeting. Targeted ads would almost undoubtedly be tailored by your cable TV provider, and would be inserted by them, not the cable network (a targeted ad would be sent to you in place of whatever ad is running on the cable network at that moment).
Since your cable TV provider is also your internet provider, then, in theory, they would have access to your browsing history.
Yes I have the same provider for cable tv & internet. I’ve been reading a lot about it and it seems there are 2 ways they can do it: one has something to do with the set top box (too technical for me to understand it) and another is that the ISP sells your browsing history to advertisers.
I don’t think that those are two different methods, per se; the set top box is how they’re delivering it, while selling your browsing history to advertisers is how they’re selecting which ads to give you. Either way, if you’re actually being targeted for specific ads on your cable TV, what would be happening is that your cable provider is the one doing the targeting, as they’re the only one that knows specifically what programming is going to your TV. They can, in theory, address your cable box with specific ads.
Whether they’re choosing to only deliver those ads on CNN, versus other stations you watch, is another question.
The more I think about it, I’m not sure if it’s only CNN. I usually have CNN on all day long (watching Sean Spicers press conference now). I’ll have to pay more attention when I watch other channels to see if it’s happening there too.
It is definitely creepy though-it feels like Big Brother is watching.
And if I see an ad for match.com, I’m going to suspect my husband is cheating :dubious:
Online advertising has been targeted like this for years, so from that standpoint, this isn’t anything new. Doesn’t mean it isn’t a little creepy, however; I do online research as I develop adventures for the roleplaying games that I run, which means that I’ll suddenly find myself getting served online ads for, say, vacation properties in Romania.
It’s WAY creepier when it’s on your TV for this reason: I am the only user of my computer, so no one sees my targeted ads but me. Lots of people watch my TV-husband, kids, friends, & it feels invasive for everyone to have clues into everyone else’s browsing history.
Not that I’m browsing for anything untoward, but it’s the same feeling as someone reading over your shoulder, even if what you are reading is totally innocent.
The actual problem that I have with targeted advertising is how it, for the most part, utterly fails in its objective. I search for something on Amazon, and then suddenly I’m being displayed ads for it, simply because of that search. I could have, you know, already bought the item, or just be looking at a ridiculous item for sale, or any number of things. Showing me an ad for an item I’ve searched for is hardly worthy of the label “targeted advertising” - it’s more like “Look what us advertisers know about your search history! So what if it doesn’t actually generate more sales?”
Similarly, I’ll go to a website once - just once - and then for months see ads for it. The entire reason I went to the website was utter disbelief that people would have a website selling that product and I see an ad for it at random. Me going to your website exactly once is a very poor indication that I actually want to buy your product compared to looking at an overall browser history for related items (or you know, going to your website more than once - but perhaps it’s too hard for software to tell?) or demographic information gleaned from Facebook that might suggest susceptibility.
My gf is in advertising. She was in a “big meeting” and projected her laptop onto a screen for all to see. As she was doing her presentation, it was noted that she had ads for portable toilets on each page.
Earlier that day I’d sent her a link for the port-a-loo (five gallon bucket) I’d ordered for our pontoon boat.
There’s a way to test if you are being targeted through the TV. Find one of the free VPN services that are available and connect to that. Then shop for something you’ve never searched for before. Give it a few days and see if you get any adverts for that item. If you do notice some then what you’re experiencing is probably confirmation bias. If you don’t see the adverts then do the searches again without the VPN and see if some appear.
It is far from perfected, but it is equally distant from utter failure. What you’re judging is targeted marketing’s lowest and least effective level - not to put too fine a point on it, but no one has found a way to make web ads effective regardless of new or old school focus or targeting. They make Direct Mail look like a sure thing and it’s only their essentially costless nature (plus the hard sell from purveyors like Google and FaceBook) that keeps them in play. Your dismissal is basically a recasting of “I saw a Bud billboard and didn’t rush out to buy a beer, so it’s all nonsense.”
Part of the problem is that online advertising is almost wholly ineffectual, something GoogleBookTter is having increasing trouble concealing from its adoring revenue base. Only a slim percentage of targeted ads within a narrow time window are more effective than plain old context ad placement. So the more invasive and controlling forms of targeting marketing at are being rushed into place, many of which are not nearly as obvious or benign as margin ads. Google can’t stay the biggest corporation in the world without efficient harvest of its user crop, so at least sit up straight while you laugh at the silly web ads. It helps with the eye tracking.
If someone was doing a presentation for a “big meeting” and was using any form of software that allowed third-party ads to be displayed, I’d start by wondering about their professionalism and probably end by finding someone else for the contract.
Today I was reading a WaPo article on my iPhone and noticed that the two ads on the page were for Sprouts and Petco. Yesterday I made purchases at… Sprouts and Petco.
I was wondering if it’s a coincidence or targeted ads, and if the latter, exactly what the chain of events was. I didn’t use my phone in any way (e.g. to have the receipt emailed to me), and I have location services turned off, so I can’t see how “they” would know I was physically inside a Sprouts and a Petco.
I did use an Amex to make both purchases, so I guess it’s possible the information originated from them. But if so, who do they hand it off to? What exactly are the procedural steps between me paying with Amex and the targeted ads showing up in my browser?
