For most of my time on PriusChat, I've gotten mostly ads from Toyota, or people wanting to sell me a Toyota. Sometimes I get ads for competitors like Ford Focus, Chevy Volt, etc. All of that makes perfect sense. Now, the other day, I went to a totally independent (so far as I know) website at bought some Calphalon cookware. I also shopped around for that and other brands on other also independent and competing websites. However, I did use the computer I sometimes use to access PriusChat. Suddenly, today, on PriusChat, I get ads for Calphalon cookware. I can't remember any ads for non-automotive stuff. SO--how does PriusChat (or the ad-suppliers websites like PriusChat contracts with) do it? Do they read a lot more of my browser's cookies than their own? Do the people I buy things from mark me as a hot prospect with their ad agencies? Or what? And last, why does somebody who apparently knows what I bought think that I'm going to buy very similar stuff again, as though I needed the same thing twice????
They are probably reading cookies from your computer, so they know where you have been (aka what you are interested in) but they don't necessarily know what you actually purchased.
Thanks. But if that's so, how come I didn't get an ad from any of the other brands that I looked at, or the website that I bought the product from, or the other sellers' websites I looked at?
Google tracks your every move on the net and tailors the ads just for you. They do that to everyone. They have quite a profile on everyone, and if you use GMail, Google Docs, Picasa, YouTube, Google+, or other Google products boy do they ever have a big profile on you. As for why you're not seeing competitors ads, perhaps they're not running an ad campaign right now.
Thanks to all. Today I got cookware ads from the same manufacturer on a random website that I had never visited before. Well, the website wasn't totally random--it did have to do with food. But it's pretty clear someone knows about me. Privacy is dead, I guess. Everyone is telling me to get over it.
Cookies are speedy. I was doing random research on the VW TDI and thought it ironic the ads showed up on PC.
They are tailoring more than just the ads. They now tailor search results and news too, to fit their perception of what you want to see. This has enormous potential for unintended consequences.
With Google, it's too often not what you want to see, but what they want you to see depending on who paid for what.
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