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Comment by Scoundreller | Hacker News Reader

> which is a very steep drop in vendors' willingness to buy Web ads

Any relative or absolute numbers you'd like to share?

> The reason is that vendors have (finally!) discovered that effectively nobody ever buys anything by clicking on a web ad.

My favourite experience with this was when I was selling a computer case and researched its specs on newegg.com. Then for a while all I saw were retargeted ads from newegg trying to sell me that case. Nonono, I didn't have one too few computer cases, I had one too many. I was the complete opposite of their target audience, heh.

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You're example is obvious because Newegg can't tell the difference between market research because you're about to buy versus research because you're about to sell.

But it's always amused me (in a not very amusing way) that immediately after I purchase something I'm inundated with advertisements from the same vendor trying to sell it to me again. Big data is supposed to be about finding statistical relationships between events, right? In what world would the probability of someone buying something be highest when they're holding a brand new one in their hands?

What it really makes me think is the web advertising folks are pulling a con on their clients. They're not actually doing the critical analysis they promise but simply sorting by linear distance in n-dimensional space and hoping no one notices how useless the measurement is.

> Newegg can't tell the difference between market research because you're about to buy versus research because you're about to sell

I agree. I think it would be very difficult for them to tell the two states apart, but I found it amusing.

Isn't this a market opportunity, though? Make a website that provides product information for people who want to sell an item. Give tips on how to advertise and mail the item. Sell packaging supplies. Why isn't Ebay already doing this?

Only if newegg had a "Sell One Like This" button, they'd earn a commission, though cases aren't worth shipping, so it was a local sale anyway.

I have the same experience with Amazon whenever I buy a big-ticket item. When I interviewed with them, I asked them if they were working on that. "Yes, but it's hard."

A few years later my brother interviewed with them and they asked him how to solve that problem. I wonder if they were stumped, and if they were just looking for new ideas.

> My favourite experience with this was when I was selling a computer case and researched its specs on newegg.com. Then for a while all I saw were retargeted ads from newegg trying to sell me that case. Nonono, I didn't have one too few computer cases, I had one too many. I was the complete opposite of their target audience, heh.

Yeah, I've had similar experiences. Back when I used to play Eve Online, I'd see banner ads everywhere for the game. Big screaming banner ads imploring me to subscribe now.

At the time I already had two accounts. By definition I was the kind of person who could not be advertised to, but the ad network was still putting effort into targeting me with those ads.

I still get them and none of my 3 (4?) accounts are subbed anymore.

Oddly I almost never see WoW ads (excluding telly), but I do get the occasional email with free time/trials. Ofc they're all scams now, but once upon a time it really was a free upgrade...

What really annoys me is the online banking websites I use (or credit card ones) that implore me to go "paperless" and "try their app", whilst logged into their system as me. Funnily enough, I do use their app (so can't they set a flag to stop showing me the advert) and I am "paperless" as I'm logging on to grab the PDF statement. Again, why can't they set a flag: if (alreadyPaperless) { showAdverts = false; }

Its a customer retention scheme. If you're a customer of bank A and you're being flooded with ads from bank B, C, and D about greenwashing and being where the cool kids hang out, the simplest way for bank A to compete with B C and D is spam their own customers with greenwashing and aspirational stuff.

Put another way, I don't know who your banks competitors are, and you might not, but your bank thinks its competitors spam campaigns currently revolve around greenwashing and aspirational, so thats the kind of retention spam they send.

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