Have you ever noticed that nearly every time you search for something on the internet, miraculously, ads for that type of item or service start popping up on all your social media, news feeds and timelines?
It doesn't matter what you're searching for either. These ads are so targeted, they will show you the exact item, size, manufacturer, and price point you want. To compound matters it seems like they also keep a history of your searches and use them to further refine the ads in front of you.
Now I will be the first to admit I have a weakness for gadgets. Organizational gadgets. Time saving gadgets. Nifty one of a kind, 'why didn't I think of that?' gadgets. And so Instagram in particular floods my feed with all sorts of gadgets.
And yes (she drops her head guiltily); I have purchased many of them.
But lately it seems the ads have become particularly overwhelming. The volume has likely increased because I have shown a penchant for purchasing from these ads.
Given I have six (yes 6!) Facebook pages, the time had come to reduce the number of ads. So I did some research and here are some helpful tips to reduce the number or type (or both) of ads you see:
--To start this process, go to Facebook settings, then click on Ads (on the left side of the page). This opens the Ads Preferences page
--Select Your Interests. You'll be shocked by how many there are -- and you can exclude these interests by hovering over the Interest and click the X in the box.
--Next, select Advertisers. Again, shocking how many there are. Hover and X them all out!
--Next, select Your Information. This is all of the information categories you allow to share with advertisers. By the way, I never ok'd this -- seems Facebook automatically made everything shareable. Do yourself a favor -- TURN THEM ALL OFF (unless you want to share some of your personal info)
--Next, select Ad Settings. There are three places to review here
1. Where it says 'Ads based on data from partners' -- make that say 'Not Allowed'
2. Where it says 'Ads based on your activity that you see elsewhere' i.e. browser searches -- change that to 'Not Allowed'
3. Where it says 'Ads that include your social actions' -- these are ad posts that other people see and you've maybe liked or commented on. This has a drop down menu that says 'Only my friends' or 'No One'. If you want to stop these ads, choose 'No One'.
--There is one last section called Hide Ad Topics where you can block ads for things you would never buy or don't want to hear about anyway. This could include issues like pets or school or medical needs -- you have the option to 'hide for 6 months' or a year or permanently!
A couple things to note before you go into Facebook to stop their incessant ad traffic:
--Under the 'Interests' and 'Advertiser' sections, there is a small, lightly colored statement at the bottom of the page that says 'show more'. Um, click that! You will find there are dozens of interests and advertisers after you.
Unfortunately I got bored/tired after X'ing out several pages worth of these things but honestly, the numbers of ads I see have already drastically reduced.
--Second, these actions will reduce your number of ads but won't completely stop them. Facebook constantly changes its algorithms to insure advertisers can get to you so you may want to remind yourself to check these settings a few times each year.
--Finally, Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter all have ways to reduce ads and while they may not be the exact same process steps, they will be similar.
