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Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

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Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#171

Post by jorvi »

baybal2 wrote: post #29

Opt out of VISA marketing https://marketingreportoptout.visa.com/OPTOUT/request.do Second, disable GPS, and cellphone tower ID reporting (root needed.) So Google can't correlate you with sales records. At the moment, there is no way to disable Google AGPS spying on the stock Android. Third, block Google apps from reading your IMEI/IMSI/serial number, so they can't get AGPS data from your cellphone provider if it sell…

> Better, get a de-Googled ROM

Which means no push, breaking an absurd amount of apps.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#172

Post by AlfeG »

jeroenhd wrote: post #107
baybal2 wrote: post #29

Opt out of VISA marketing https://marketingreportoptout.visa.com/OPTOUT/request.do Second, disable GPS, and cellphone tower ID reporting (root needed.) So Google can't correlate you with sales records. At the moment, there is no way to disable Google AGPS spying on the stock Android. Third, block Google apps from reading your IMEI/IMSI/serial number, so they can't get AGPS data from your cellphone provider if it sell…

This is the dumbest ad strategy ever. Why on earth would ads about a product you just bought be effective marketing material. This is like how you get a million ads about dishwashers the day after you Google around and buy one. At least wait for a short duration of time to let the target run out of medicine before adversiting new stuff.

Yandex Ads network has a wonderful button - "I'm already bought this product" to stop ad spam on the things already at home )

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#173

Post by sokoloff »

AlfeG wrote: post #172
jeroenhd wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the dumbest ad strategy ever. Why on earth would ads about a product you just bought be effective marketing material. This is like how you get a million ads about dishwashers the day after you Google around and buy one. At least wait for a short duration of time to let the target run out of medicine before adversiting new stuff.

Yandex Ads network has a wonderful button - "I'm already bought this product" to stop ad spam on the things already at home )

Why would I want to give the ad networks additional information and make their advertising more efficient? Given they exist, I’m perfectly okay with advertisers wasting money on badly targeted ads.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#174

Post by duckfang »

sct202 wrote: post #67

In America, some stores seem to share rewards member information to product companies so they can target their ads on other platforms. For example, I paid for a very specific candy from CVS using my credit card, but used my partner's CVS rewards member number and they got ads on facebook for that candy while I haven't seen a thing.

Whenever places wantba phone number for ad and/or discount stuff, use:

(Local area code) 867-5309

There's always an account, and it's a 100% gamble if this purchase you get something.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#175

Post by cperciva »

scruple wrote: post #158
metafunctor wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno, I’ve bought several guitars in a row…

Well I've had it happen with toilet seats. In 40 years on this planet I've only ever needed to purchase that one. I'd imagine if I needed to get more than one that I would get them all at the same time.

There's probably a nontrivial number of people who renovate houses one bathroom at a time.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#176

Post by dkdk8283 »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #112
baybal2 wrote: post #29

Opt out of VISA marketing https://marketingreportoptout.visa.com/OPTOUT/request.do Second, disable GPS, and cellphone tower ID reporting (root needed.) So Google can't correlate you with sales records. At the moment, there is no way to disable Google AGPS spying on the stock Android. Third, block Google apps from reading your IMEI/IMSI/serial number, so they can't get AGPS data from your cellphone provider if it sell…

Even better: flush your smartphone down the toilet. I mean, if you have to try and double-guess your phone to make sure it's not spying on you the game is lost. I don't even know what game that is. But it's lost.

Get a landline and answering machine. Receive only pager while on the go.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#177

Post by dkdk8283 »

fsflover wrote: post #133
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even better: flush your smartphone down the toilet. I mean, if you have to try and double-guess your phone to make sure it's not spying on you the game is lost. I don't even know what game that is. But it's lost.

Or replace your phone with a one you can trust (Linux phone).

You still can’t trust the baseband blob which has DMA access on most devices.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#178

Post by harikb »

pen2l wrote: post #159

Tangentially related, for the first time ever I saw Gmail losing its anti-spam game. We were doing some home-modeling and we went to Home Depot sometime early this month. And... some entity somehow discovered this. And then all of a sudden I started getting spam emails related to Home Depot's/home rebuilding. The spam emails successfully pass through gmail's filter because they seem to emanate from aol,gmail,hotmail,…

There are so many possibilities here. There is the stores you visited and the Credit card company involved along with anyone of the ad tech partners who have a cookie on you tied to your email.

Now how they know you bought X

1. Say CC sells data to say Bluekai (now salesforce). If you bought a hammer, they need not have known it was from HD, a middle man might simply be bidding for anyone categorized as shopping for home improvement goods and hoping to cash in on HD lead-gen/affiliate $$$

2. You likely searched online for these at some site and probably just don’t remember that you did.

The only thing that will get rid of this is to ban/regulate “affiliate” marketing (so shady companies who don’t follow rules can’t cash in), because so long as someone is willing to pay to bring sales, it will happen on way or another.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#179

Post by dr_dshiv »

sokoloff wrote: post #173
AlfeG wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yandex Ads network has a wonderful button - "I'm already bought this product" to stop ad spam on the things already at home )

Why would I want to give the ad networks additional information and make their advertising more efficient? Given they exist, I’m perfectly okay with advertisers wasting money on badly targeted ads.

Because some things in life are win win. I actually prefer relevant ads vs irrelevant ads.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#180

Post by lorentztt »

II2II wrote: post #147
baybal2 wrote: post #29

Opt out of VISA marketing https://marketingreportoptout.visa.com/OPTOUT/request.do Second, disable GPS, and cellphone tower ID reporting (root needed.) So Google can't correlate you with sales records. At the moment, there is no way to disable Google AGPS spying on the stock Android. Third, block Google apps from reading your IMEI/IMSI/serial number, so they can't get AGPS data from your cellphone provider if it sell…

> Better, get a de-Googled ROM If you have the patience and knowledge, I can't recommend this enough. If you don't have the patience and the knowledge, this is a good way to end up with a non-functioning phone. (It will probably be recoverable, provided that you have the patience to acquire that knowledge and don't mind being without a phone in the meantime.) When I say I can't recommend it enough, I mean it. I have…

Which one do you use/recommend?
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