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PayPal plans an ad network built off your purchase history
(www.theregister.com)
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this post was submitted on 29 May 2024
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So, advertising the things I have already bought? Not sure thats gonna be super successful...
Amazon has done that for the past 2 decades and it has somehow worked.
We noticed you bought a fridge yesterday. Are you interested in these fridges, too?
Perhaps more like what fridge companies do via incessant water filter replacement reminders: Enjoying your Super Deluxe CoolPlus™ Fridge? Don't forget to check out the CoolPlus™ Fridge Magnetic Spice Rack and CoolPlus™ Fridge Juice Dispenser Add-on!
Also enjoy your device randomly breaking every few years.
At some point the bigwigs will realize that a working item is worth more in future potential ad dollars than a broken one with a limited 1 year warranty and start asking their engineers why quality is so bad.
/The screams of 1,000 poor souls per second for 50 years
They did that like 60 years ago. Then they stopped.
Gonna catch'em all!
pictures someone trying to catch fridges like in some kind of video game
Has it worked? Its never led to a repeat purchase for me. :/
Maybe they won't suggest things you already bought, but will estimate what you're going to buy next, based on the statistical analysis of people who bought the same things.
Yeah it’s more like, hey you just bought stabilizing jacks and a water hose for a travel trailer. You must have just bought a new camper. Let’s bombard you with add for stick-up-hooks, rv-mattress sized sheets, cheap plastic dishes, etc.
If only it was smart enough. Make its like oh you bought a newtv, you would like this new surround system
That would be actually valuable for consumers and advertisers. Shame its impossible.
The "people usually both this with this product" suggestions can be pretty good to cover this.
with stuff like this, usually the objective is to advertise based on patterns across purchase histories
I'm sure thats the theory, and whats being sold to the ad buyers, but my money is on it ending up like the ads you get after buying something from amazon/ebay: same item you just bought.
you probably just notice that because it doesn't make sense from your perspective.
it's probably more cost efficient for advertisers to just throw relevant ads at potential groups. Determining whether an individual already has the item is a waste of resources, and you probably don't notice when the ads are things you don't own.
Last time I observed this I was getting the exact same item that I bought being advertised to me constantly, across multiple sites. No variation at all. It was a pair of hiking shoes. If it had then offered me hiking poles or rain coats or anything else that would have been useful, but instead it was the same pair of shoes I had already purchased.
If the ad network had actually suggested useful paired items that i dont already own, then those ads should actually stand out, as they are actually relevant to me.
If its not cost efficient to actually target to the individual (and I dont doubt that it isn't), im not sure what Paypal is bringing to the table here that Amazon etc can't already do.
More like using your past purchases to predict what you will most likely be prone to buy next