Ask HN: Does targeted advertising work at all?
Yes. Brands, third parties, google, etc have all ran incremental sales lift tests, brand lift studies, customer lifetime value tests, etc and determined how successful tactics are and moved budget accordingly. There is a reason google&#x2F;etc are worth billions.<p>I’ve posted this comment before, but:<p>1. It’s hard to tell when someone has bought a product. You buy it at a reseller and the brand will never know. Or you buy it on mobile, but have researched the brand on desktop. Or you purchased it at work, but were researching it at home. Advertisers suppress known buyers but they don’t perfectly match you to all of your devices.<p>2. Just like there are not so good developers and not so good code, there are not so good marketers who aren’t that great at their job. Or they have too much work and didn’t set it up correctly. DSPs are extremely extremely complicated, so it’s to make mistakes.<p>3. Retention and advertising to previous purchasers drives more additional purchases. Maybe you only purchased blinds for the main floor of your house but not the basement.