I do wonder to what degree the effectiveness of advertising is intentionally exaggerated. Surely the advertisers who depend on the public to think their product is effective would collectively spend a lot more time and effort on that advertising campaign than any other.

That said, I've seen some compelling ads this year - it seemed more a function of correctly guessing my interests and tastes than successfully influencing my behaviour.

>I freely admit to being in this camp, but the ads that I get on the Internet (when I do get them) are so irrelevant that I'm almost never tempted to click on them.

While the actual product being advertised may be irrelevant, do remember the names of the companies selling them? Congratulations, the ad was successful

>While the actual product being advertised may be irrelevant, do remember the names of the companies selling them?

I can't think of any company names that I'm not a customer of. I can think of a few products (Raid Shadow Legends), but it seems like that's a pretty huge investment just to make me remember a product I know I'm not going to use.

> I can't think of any company names that I'm not a customer of.

I actually find this hard to believe.

I can name at least several car companies that sell cars I can't afford and probably never will (Porche, Ferrari, Lotus, Aston Martin, McLaren, or even Tesla). I prefer Coke over Pepsi and don't buy soda unless I'm at a fast food place yet I recognize at least a dozen brands. I don't shop at Walmart when I don't need (< once a year) to and never been to a Sam's club. I don't own Cyberpunk or even a Windows machine. I haven't been to a McDonald's in the last 5 years except when presented with no alternative (~3 times?). I've never played CandyCrush yet you can't open a Windows machine or a phone app without being bombarded with it (Angry Birds used to be like that too). You can't open Reddit without political memes (many are actually ads). Every single one of these companies/products has also advertised to me and I'm willing to bet you as well.

Either you're able to afford a lavish lifestyle or I'd like to know how I could live in this blissful world that you found (and escape the advertised filled one I live in).

You're right about cars, but I'm unsure whether that's from ads or not. I rarely if ever see advertisements for cars, unless you consider TV shows like Top Gear/Grand Tour to be advertisements for cars.

I think the difference is that I live in a different country. I don't consume much local media and even if I did there are few enough local products that you would've heard of all of them by word of mouth. Take the soda as an example. I've certainly seen Coke and Pepsi ads, but I've not seen (or at least can't remember) ads for about half the sodas in my local supermarket. Even when Coke released Coke Zero the first time I found out about it was seeing it on a shelf in a store.

But let's say that all of what you're saying is true. The effect from it seems quite small. I'd estimate that I spend at least 5 minutes a day seeing ads.

I linked this in another reply, but the most common ads now are native ads[0]. The point of these is to not appear as ads. With this in mind I believe that you can say that shows like Top Gear are partially ads (obviously not all ad). But like I said before, most car ads aren't actually trying to get you to buy their car. They are trying to get you to think a certain way about a brand (e.g. "A Lexis!!!! WOW! HIGH CLASS!). This should be obvious (post hoc) when you realize that luxury car brands advertise a lot to the general public (Superbowl, prime time TV, etc) and not just to the rich (you can actually find a lot of literature on this). People don't buy cars frequently and honestly when they do, they tend to do more research than most other purchases because it is one of the biggest expenses they'll have. You can also question Coke advertising. They could never spend a single dollar on advertising and you'd still know about them. Cars and Coke are just the obvious examples of advertising not just being about awareness, but other things as well (other things depends on the market).

So what I'm trying to say is that you think you see 5 minutes of advertising but I'm fairly confident you see substantially more (and if not, you're not just an outlier, but an extreme outlier). I'll give another example: the link from this post not only contains several ads on its page, but is an ad itself([0]). And I want to re-emphasize that many memes you see are also ads (again falling under the native category).

Ads have changed a lot in the last decade and if you think ads are just popups, the things on the side of your screen, or what plays between your favorite show, then you're not keeping up[1]. And more importantly, you have to think beyond products (I think this is our major disconnect).

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_advertising

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guerrilla_marketing

Try thinking about product categories - fridges, TVs, toothbrushes, etc. - and see what brands pop into your mind. Then ask yourself why those brands. In many cases, the honest answer may be because you've been exposed to ads of these brands more than ads of the others.

The other poster is actually right - there are some categories that fit, such as cars. However, from the categories you listed I can't really name anything. I assume companies like Samsung make the things you mentioned, but I'd have to look it up. I certainly can't think of seeing an ad for any of them (except toothbrushes).

There are only a few brands of toothbrushes in supermarkets here. I've seen ads from them, but the reason I know the brands exist is because I've used their toothbrushes or paste. In the store I pick whatever's cheap.

So I think there's a lot more nuance to this than is accurately being conveyed here. I can make a decent guess by two important factors to your post and a third supposition. 1) you specify ads on the internet (this is actually important because it specifically refers to your digital footprints) 2) you say you're not in the West and suggest a smaller developing country. I don't think it is unlikely then that you aren't as well tracked around the web. 3) more speculation, but judging by you being on HN and saying "when I do get them" I'm guessing you use ad blockers or have some privacy preserving features that help. This also reduces your digital footprint and irrelevant ads would be a marker of success of these products instead of irrelevance of ads (if 3 doesn't apply to you, I know it is applying to some here and they aren't thinking about it this way).

But I guess some things to look out for. There are far more than just "you might be interested in this product" type of ads. There are political ads, public awareness ads, moral campaigns/religious ads. There are ads that aren't intended to get you to buy a product but rather to be satisfied with your purchase (see coke). There are ads that are used to sell prestige and status associated with a brand (see cars and watches). There's native advertising[0] which often goes unnoticed and is a frequent guest on HN. The tricky things of ads is that they come in a wide variety of flavors but people think "coke" is the only kind of soda. It is also a cat and mouse game. Old Spice created their ridiculous ads (called anti-advertising) to stand out because saturation of one type took over. Native advertising has been growing over the last decade and taken prominence in the space and the entire intent of native advertising is to be an ad without the reader/viewer knowing that they are watching an ad.

Sure, maybe they don't affect you. But how sure can you be? Especially with the knowledge of native advertising. But let's assume they do not work on you. Does it matter if they work on others? It would be an absurd notion to suggest that they don't. With hundreds of millions of dollars being spent on ads per year (by single companies!) it would be a bit odd for them to be throwing this money down the drain. It would be a bit odd for politicians to do this as well. And once you accept the notion that political ads are a thing I think you have to accept that ads can persuade people to do things beyond buying a product. Carnegie and Rockafeller both used advertising to increase their public image in the early 20th century.

It would be odd for people to spend so much money on something that isn't effective.

Edit: I wanted to give a good example. If you watch "The Boys" on Amazon Prime (great show) you can see how Starfire's memes are all in fact a part of a marketing scheme and about brand awareness. This would be a version of native advertising, and one we've seen quite frequently, especially around political campaigns. But I don't think these types of memes even register as ads in most peoples' minds.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_advertising