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Targeted ads are everywhere.
These ads can sometimes be helpful, but not when I’ve already purchased the product.
How Do Targeted Ads Work?
Justin Duino / How-To Geek
Related:What Are Personalized Ads, and How Do They Work?
Companies track your activity across the internet andcompile information to create a profile on you.
Ad providers such as Google, Facebook, and Amazonuse cookies to track you around the web.
That’s how Instagram knows what you were looking at on Amazon.
This happens all the time.
I’ll be looking for new shoes for a couple of days on Amazon and Zappos.
The ads for shoes I’ve looked at follow me around the internet.
Related:How Much Is Your Data Worth to Advertisers?
This is the glaring weak spot of targeted ads.
In fact, it’s pretty annoying.
Why is an ad for a pair of Nikes I already own interrupting my Instagram Stories!?
There needs to be some sort of “Already Purchased” button on ads.
Plus, ads in apps on your phone are usually harder to dismiss.
How to Opt Out of Targeted Ads
So what can you do about these annoying ads?
Sadly, there really isn’t a direct way to tell advertisers you’ve already purchased something.
There are a number of different ways to do this, depending on how aggressive you want to be.
Instead, you’ll just get generic ads that aren’t tailored to you.
I’m not necessarily anti-targeted ads.
There have been times where I’ve found genuinely useful products from ads.
Just like stop showing me shoes.
