Do you ever get the feeling like you’re being watched?
The other day, I was thinking about buying this blanket online. I put it in my cart,
but then kinda waffled 'cause it was expensive, and then I got distracted and did something
else. I just received a personal Facebook message from the company reminding
me that it's in my cart! How did they do that? I don’t even use the
same email addresses for these accounts! Is Facebook listening
to me?
Don’t go getting fit for your tinfoil hat just yet. There isn’t any hard evidence
that Facebook is surreptitiously accessing your phone’s mic, and even if they could,
the volumes of data they’d have to analyze to eavesdrop on just their American users
would be about 20 petabytes per day… 33 times more than their total daily data consumption.
Besides, online tracking technology is so advanced these days, they don’t really need
to. You’re dropping bread crumbs everywhere you go.
Imagine if you went to a shopping mall and had an employee follow you around upselling
the entire time:
Don’t you just love that shirt? Give me your email and I’ll give you $5 off right
now! Hey, remember that yoga mat you looked at last week? Well guess what, 5 other people
just bought it and say it’s the best ever! 10% off if you buy it right now! Hey, don’t forget
it’s your mom’s birthday next week. She’d love this hilarious coffee mug! Or maybe
this fancy candle? Three for the price of one if you just use this code!
No one likes being badgered by an overly excited employee. But that’s basically what’s
happening when you shop online. And it can take a serious toll on our bank accounts.
So let’s get clear on what companies are really doing and what we can do about it.
The main tactic that e-tailers use is called Online Behavioral Advertising. It’s pretty
darn sophisticated and getting more so every day. Here’s how it works: First, a website
will implant a small piece of data on your computer known as a cookie. Sounds cute, but
this cookie comes with strings attached. It tracks how you maneuver around a website.
What pages you click on, how long you hang out there, what you search for, what you add
to your cart.
It then harvests this data and uses it to build a profile. It tries to guess things
like your age, your income bracket, your likes and dislikes all in hopes of serving you ads
that are the most likely to capture your attention.
As new parents, we do most of our shopping online, which makes us prime targets. Julia
was recently served up an ad for baby-booties that don’t slip off.
If you didn’t know, keeping socks or shoes on babies’ feet is basically impossible,
so of course my attention was captured. I clicked the link and wouldn’t ya know it...5
minutes later I was checking out. And now, those dang shoes pop up on EVERY SITE I’M
ON! I feel like I can’t escape! Thanks, cookies.
This is a textbook example of “re-targeting,” Only 2% of users will become a customer on
their first visit, so a cookie’s job is to quietly follow you around cyberspace, waiting
for the right time to invite you back to their store.
If a retailer has gotten access to your contact information like your email, you will also be
barraged with personalized ads and offers. Amazon is the absolute king of this tactic.
Say you buy a yoga mat, they will assume you probably need this awesome yoga shirt, oh
and you gotta have yoga blocks and what about yoga socks?! These approaches are super effective.
A re-targeted ad is 70% more likely to become a paying customer than a randomly served one.
Amazon is also famous for leveraging something called “social proof,” our tendency to
copy the actions of others because we assume they know more than we do. This is why 87%
of users report that they use customer reviews to decide on a purchase. Of course, because
this is the internet, this has led to an entire hidden economy of sellers paying people to
write fake reviews for their products. Amazon claims that the percentage of reviews that
are fraudulent is “tiny,” but they don’t really have much of an incentive to crack
down on them because the more good reviews, the more sales. There are websites that will
analyze a product page and tell you how many of the reviews are suspect, but the methods
these sites use are not proven to be 100% accurate.
All this wouldn’t be so bad if going online was something you did every once in a while.
But according to a recent Nielsen study, Americans spend approximately 11 hours PER DAY staring
at screens. That’s like spending half your life in a shopping mall. It’s no surprise
that one out of every three dollars of discretionary spending is being spent online.
While avoiding online shopping altogether probably isn’t realistic, there are things
we can do to minimize the creepy stalking from retailers so we can shop more deliberately.
First, set up an email account for your online shopping. That way, all the spam
and promotional offers won’t be clogging your primary inbox.
Next, you can regularly delete cookies and “un-remember” your credit card numbers
from your browser’s memory. I know, I know, this will make online shopping less convenient
because you’ll have to keep re-entering your info, but remember, we’re trying to
fight brainlessness and make purchasing as intentional as possible. E-tailers want shopping
to be effortless, because they know that the more steps involved, the more chances you’ll
have to realize that you don’t really need those fancy yoga socks. If you’re not sure
how to do this, just google, "How to erase cookies in..." The name of your browser
And lastly, we strongly recommend setting a hard cap for online expenditures by opening
a separate checking account or online wallet that’s only for shopping online. Top it
off with how much you want to allow yourself to spend per month, and when it’s empty,
well, you’ll just have to wait till next month to get that that 4K Blu-Ray of The Matrix.
I admit it, I love seeing those packages show up at my door as much as the next person,
but for most people, shopping online is a luxury. The vast majority of necessities like
groceries and household supplies are still purchased at brick and mortar stores.
E-tailers want us to treat online shopping like a normal, habitual part of lives, but
any discretionary spending should still be a special, deliberate decision. You probably can’t
ever get away from online advertising, but you can at least be aware of how it’s trying
to influence your behavior.
And that’s our two cents!
Are there any other ways online advertisers are driving you crazy?
I'd love to hear about it in the comments.