Saturday, April 28, 2012

Why are Google and Facebook ads so crappy?

In our world billions of dollars are spent trying to get us to read and click ads.

Billions.

So why are the ads so crappy? Google, which knows more about me than my mother, offered me these two next to my Gmail:
Master of Science Nursing
Earn a CCNE Accredited Masters in Nursing Online - Norwich University...

Overstock iPads 2: $43.20
Today Only: Get 32GB iPads for $43. 1 Per Customer. Limited Quantities...
A probably fake diploma program (or it's Norwich in the UK?!) and a con. Either Google thinks I'm an easy mark (demented already?), or it doesn't really know me after all.

Facebook is no better.

Really, spammers do better. After all, I'm marginally more likely to pay for genital enhancement than to send money to a con man. (I can imagine, for example, developing a brain tumor that might radically change my personality.)

It's not that I'm opposed to viewing ads. I pay $20 a year so that, in part, I can read the ads in Silent Sports.

Let me repeat that one. I actually turn over cold cash to read ads. I'm not the only one. Once upon I would, on occasion, buy a giant monthly phonebook sized slab of newsprint called "Computer Shopper" so I could read the friggin' ads.

I don't read or click Google or Facebook ads. Not because of an ideological objection -- but because they're worthless.

So where are all those billions going? Why doesn't Google or Facebook ask me what ads I'd like to see?

Why am I the only person who seems to notice this? Is it really just me?

There's something very strange going on here.

3 comments:

  1. Google and Facebook ad publishers are crappy – they decide (and pay for) what you are going to see (if you do not block ads) …

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  2. I hadn't thought of that Martin. It's a good theory -- that the reason ads are so bad is that only crooks are buying Facebook/Google adwords.

    This would be analogous to day time TV, where all the advertisements are for semi-fraudulent services for low income persons with poor judgment.

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  3. That's why i am not believe to buy a ads for web promotion!! i didn't buy any single ads! They both are totally fake!

    ReplyDelete