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You just bought a washing machine... could I interest you in a washing machine?
by ape4 4y ago
You just bought a washing machine... could I interest you in a washing machine?
- im3w1l 4y agoGPT can solve this! I prompted it with "Sarah bought a washing machine and a ". It completed "dryer.". Another "If you buy a hammer you might also want to buy " -> "a nail". Ill forgive the singular. Just to be clear those are not cherry picked - they were my first two attempts.
- ape4 4y agoPutting those together... I actually bought a pair of anti hammer arrestors for the washing machine ;)
- thaumasiotes 4y ago> GPT can solve this! I prompted it with "Sarah bought a washing machine and a ". It completed "dryer.". The most natural interpretation there is that Sarah bought a washing machine and a dryer simultaneously, not that, after buying a washing machine the month prior, she was finally ready to buy a dryer.
- Mordisquitos 4y agoFair enough regarding the washer/dryer, but I'm unimpressed by the hammer/nail example. If anything, I might want to buy "some nails" rather than "a nail", but I would argue that's not a brilliant guess either—if I'm buying a hammer I most likely already own the item that I want to hit with it. Some more interesting suggestions could have been for example "some pliers", "a set of screwdrivers", "a pair of work gloves", "safety goggles", etc.
- mdp2021 4y agoWhile the chief absurdity is very clear (also mocked by Spitting Image - J.B. on a date: "You loved that steak? Good, I'll order another one!"), I am afraid that the intended idea may be that your memory about the ads of what you just bought will last as much as said goods. Utter nightmare (unnatural obsolescence, systemic perversity, pollution...) but. I have met R'n'D who admitted the goal was just to have something new to have people want to replace the old, on unsubstantial grounds.
- armchairhacker 4y agoI think the reason this happens is that when you start looking for washing machines, you start getting ads for them. Then when you buy nobody tells the ad companies that you just bought a washing machine so they still send you ads because they think you’re still looking. Even if you just went straight to the model site and clicked “buy”.
- thaumasiotes 4y agoWe know that's not the reason; Amazon is infamous for advertising washing machines to people who have just bought a washing machine from Amazon.
- jsjohnst 4y agoAmazon can’t suggest a “product you might like” if their life depended on it. They have 19 years of purchase history for me spanning thousands of product categories. Want to know a category I’ve never looked at or bought from Amazon, women's handbags. What’s near the top of the suggestions right now on the homepage for me? You guessed it!
- thaumasiotes 4y ago> Amazon can’t suggest a “product you might like” if their life depended on it. Actually, there is one method they use to make suggestions that works very well. If you have a wishlist, sometimes they'll recommend items from there.
- oriolid 4y agoThe weirdest thing is that at one point, I think it's now almost 10 years, they had somewhat OK recommendations. It's not like "you bought programming books and Battlestar Galactica DVDs, so you might be interested in Neal Stephenson's novels" is really advanced but it's still miles ahead of the "you just bought a washing machine, so you might be interested in washing machines" level.
- 4y ago
- bolasanibk 4y agoI cannot remember the reference now, but the reasoning I read was a person who just bought an item x might: 1. return the item if they are not satisfied with it and get a replacement Or 2. buy another one as a gift if they really like it. Both of these result in a higher fraction of conversions in this kind of targeting vs other targeting criteria.
- astrea 4y agoI’m also more inclined to believe that the ad networks simply don’t have a way of knowing a sale was made.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- wrycoder 4y agoI buy a package of underwear. All I see for next three weeks on my browser is close ups of men’s briefs. It’s embarrassing, when associates glance at my screen.
- speedgoose 4y agoI agree it can be embarrassing to not use an ad blocker.
- jstx1 4y agoKind of your fault - you're buying your underwear on a work device and you don't use an adblocker.
- wrycoder 4y ago1. Not a work device. 2. We are discussing how ads are selected for presentation.
- jsjohnst 4y agoWhile this annoys the hell out of me too, there is a semi-logical explanation that makes sense in many cases: The ad targeting knows you looked at washing machines, but doesn’t know you purchased.
- kristopolous 4y agoWhich is an extremely trivial check to add - if you got assigned that ticket, you'd probably point it at like 2 or so hours. However, they've been like this for over a decade so it's likely there intentionally. here's one way that could be possible: There could be some popular third party service that's integrated on many e-commerce sites that sells this information and doesn't actually give a damn if you bought the refrigerator or not. They're selling you, not the refrigerator. That's the problem with data brokers, it's mostly low quality data.
- jsjohnst 4y ago> Which is an extremely trivial check to add - if you got assigned that ticket, you'd probably point it at like 2 or so hours. Yep, totally a 2hr task for an engineer who works on homedepot.com to “check” that you bought a fridge from lowes.com after you first price shopped the other site. Also a two hour task for a Google engineer to know you bought one in person at Best Buy after researching online first. Yes, there are basic cases (buying from same merchant as who’s suggesting) that should be handled, but let’s not foolishly pretend that’s the average case, let alone majority / all.
- Asooka 4y agoA slightly more ridiculous one I experienced recently was when I searched where to buy tool X. Started getting ads for why I need tool X and why it's the best tool ever. I already want one, I'm looking where to buy, not trying to learn what it's for!
- saurik 4y agoCollege Humor--may it rest in peace :( :( :(--did a great bit about this a few years ago. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbKdKcGJ4tM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbKdKcGJ4tM It is absolutely ridiculous how useless targeted ads actually are... and seeing a real person try to sell you this stuff really underscores the insanity.
- maxbond 4y agoCollege Humor is alive and well! At least if you enjoy Dungeons and Dragons and silly game shows.
- BonoboIO 4y agoSometimes you want a company like Facebook or google deliver ads to your potential costumer, but you don’t want, that the ad company knows how much product you sold. You know your ROI, but your ad company doesn‘t. I heard multiple stories from amazon, that hey still let the ad campaign or targeting running even if you bought the product for random times so external companies could not get insight in your businesses. If you got the washing machine you will not click to buy another. If you pay per click, it makes no difference how long you let the campaign running if it is targeted. I work in the ad industry.
- BonoboIO 4y ago
- Gibbon1 4y agoI merely looked at pressure cookers and got ads for full figured bra's and support garments for six months.