You buy x at y store, y store has an ad buy with ShadyAdCo. If you see product x in an ad within z time afterwards, it counts as an influence towards your purchase. ShadyAdCo just made money, and y store can give record numbers.
EDIT: typo
It also fails to account for awareness being a major reason to buy ads. Ford want to advertise to everybody (probably including Amish) because most people will eventually buy a car, and it is important that you think Ford then. Even if you bought a car yesterday it is important to them that you not forget that you can buy a Ford - they know you won't buy for a few years, but they still want you to think of them.
"This location tracking ability has allowed Google to send reports to retailers telling them, for example, whether people who saw an ad for a lawn mower later visited or passed by a Home Depot. The location-tracking program has grown since it was first launched with only a handful of retailers. Home Depot, Express, Nissan, and Sephora have participated."
[1]https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/05/23...
Ask yourself why Facebook counts "post-view" conversions instead of only post-click like AdWords and most others.
New client had been working off the assumption they were seeing ROAS of around 3 (not terrible). When we showed them how to see just the post-click, ROAS is now at 1. That means even if they are selling a product they received for free or stole, ie COGS = 0, they still only breakeven.
Attribution is the key. All this assumes that ad companies and Facebook are honest in the first place about the number of views and clicks an ad has received. Their behavior does not engender much good will for a benefit of the doubt situation.
It's genuinely bizarre when Amazon does it. They know I just bought a $500 vacuum... surely they've got the machine learning chops to teach their algorithm that means I shouldn't ever see a vacuum as a sponsored product for a couple years?
Like come on, I just sent you a bunch of these!
If you buy something, you might land in one of those buckets. Advertiser can buy impressions to those buckets. The buckets are not refreshed on a daily basis (depending on the audience provider), and therefor can contain stale data.
e.g. you bought a blue striped t-shirt from H&M and it is continually advertised to you by H&M for a few days.
In a completely different context, ads can be used to reenforce status. That was a separate distinct point gp was making. If you want to buy luxury goods, but can't afford them, a well placed gucci ad can act as a brand anchor & keep you yearning.
Your point stands, that the "mega retarget post amazon ads" are a flaw in the system, but as the system gets more data, they will be tweaked to be more effective.
This specific case - "here are some other vacuums you didn't buy" - is one that seems more likely to hurt my brand loyalty and post-purchase feelings than anything else.
Chances being that anything that irks you about your new vacuum are going to be most accutely felt in the initial period.
So reminding you heavily that there are other, greener-grass vacuums out there seems productive in inceptioning "I'll never buy X brand again!" resentment.
They can do that with random data and it'll work just as well. It's called divination and you don't need to track me for it.
Most recently for me, it was a plumbing part. Now I have targeted ads everywhere for these parts. Sorry org, I finished my project and I won't be doing something similar, hopefully, ever again.