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Certainly not. And I wouldn’t take on a client that wanted to do that because it’s unethical. Not to mention Facebook doesn’t provide obesity or anything close

Certainly not. And I wouldn’t take on a client that wanted to do that because it’s unethical. Not to mention Facebook doesn’t provide obesity or anything close to that as a targeting criteria. We advertise for a lot of yoga studios for example. We also advertise yoga teacher trainings etc. I guess I just want to point out that not all advertising is unscrupulous. My clients do business honestly and sell something that is highly valuable that people want. If people click on my ads, I know that they are buying an experience or product that they will enjoy. Not to say there’s not a lot of shady stuff going on like you describe, because there absolutely is. And believe me I am more against it than anyone because it makes every one of us who do business honestly and promote other businesses who do the same look bad.

tinokid 9y ago
>not all advertising is unscrupulous That's a strawman. But even if the businesses you work for are decent, they are nevertheless in competition, a "race to the bottom" if you will, with unscrupulous ones. And even if the consequences of a hypothetical overhyped-but-mediocre yoga class are not dire, there are many products for which this is not the case (smoking, skydiving, sugary drinks, surgery, etc).
- clay_the_ripper 9y ago
  If you’re saying that are participating in a capitalistic marketplace, then yes that’s true as it is true for every business in the United States. Putting our feelings about the system in place aside, people still want things, and businesses have missions besides a profit motive. Not all of them, again I’m speaking only for myself. I had a conversation with the founder of a yoga school, one of our clients, and I told him that we could raise our prices a little bit because they were having some cash flow issues and their prices were far below market. This is one of the oldest, best and most reputable schools in the world. And he said “no, I know we could but that’s not why I started this. I like to keep it cheap so people can afford to come here”. His mission is not profit driven. Sure, he has to make money to keep the place open, pay teachers etc. But his mission is to get more people doing yoga. Whether you think yoga is a worthy cause or not is besides the point. Facebook and google are hugely important for him so people can find out about their offering. I know this guy is an outlier, but I think it’s an important thing to remember that good people out there are doing good things with the power of Facebook ads.

tinokid 9y ago

>not all advertising is unscrupulous That's a strawman. But even if the businesses you work for are decent, they are nevertheless in competition, a "race to the bottom" if you will, with unscrupulous ones. And even if the consequences of a hypothetical overhyped-but-mediocre yoga class are not dire, there are many products for which this is not the case (smoking, skydiving, sugary drinks, surgery, etc).

clay_the_ripper 9y ago
If you’re saying that are participating in a capitalistic marketplace, then yes that’s true as it is true for every business in the United States. Putting our feelings about the system in place aside, people still want things, and businesses have missions besides a profit motive. Not all of them, again I’m speaking only for myself. I had a conversation with the founder of a yoga school, one of our clients, and I told him that we could raise our prices a little bit because they were having some cash flow issues and their prices were far below market. This is one of the oldest, best and most reputable schools in the world. And he said “no, I know we could but that’s not why I started this. I like to keep it cheap so people can afford to come here”. His mission is not profit driven. Sure, he has to make money to keep the place open, pay teachers etc. But his mission is to get more people doing yoga. Whether you think yoga is a worthy cause or not is besides the point. Facebook and google are hugely important for him so people can find out about their offering. I know this guy is an outlier, but I think it’s an important thing to remember that good people out there are doing good things with the power of Facebook ads.