Why Am I Seeing This Ad? How Social Media Ads Target You
Every social media site out there shows us ads. But sometimes, those ads can get very specific towards you, often showing you ads that seem creepy and stalkerish. How do they do that?
Stop The Spam: You Can Control The Facebook Ads You See [Weekly Facebook Tips]
Are you seeing irrelevant ads from Facebook? Here's why Facebook is showing you these ads and what you can do to influence them.
Facebook Makes Money Out of Your Data, Why Shouldn’t You?
There are so many free services online because companies can profit from the data you provide. Companies like Facebook sell (or buy) your data to third parties, while ones like Google use your data to target ads directly at you. As the saying goes, if you're not paying for something, you're the product, not the customer. But if these companies can make money from your data, why can't you make money from your own data?
Winning At eBay Classifieds - How To Write Great Ads
You probably already know about eBay, but believe it or not, the core site has a secondary site: the eBay Classifieds. The site is quite a bit like Craigslist in functionality and purpose, but it has a much cleaner, fresher design. However, in order for your item to sell, you need to know how to sell it. Fortunately, MakeUseOf has pulled its resources together to develop a fantastic article about writing great ads for the eBay Classifieds.
Facebook Ads vs Google Adwords: Which One Got Me The Most Clicks?
I honestly never thought that I'd be paying for any sort of advertising for my blog, at least not until it entered into the "big time", with many hundreds of thousands of pageviews per day. I never really believed that the cost of advertising on a small scale could really be worth the results. If you only invest less than $10 a day into an advertising campaign, can it really have any impact at all? Don't most advertising campaigns require hundreds of dollars a month or more? This is the question that I set out to answer at the beginning of this year
The Advertisers Guide To Mobile [INFOGRAPHIC]
We've had Web 1.0 and 2.0. Now we're into the era of the Smartphone Web, the time when every man and his dog has a smartphone in their pocket, playing Angry Birds on the bus, and doing price comparison shopping in the middle of a store. My wife and I are extremely guilty of that. We've been thrown out of many shops because we've stood there with our phones and compared prices with online stores to see who is cheaper.
An Apple (Ad) A Day: Top Ten Commercials You’re Likely To Remember
Apple is a company that you either love or hate; there's very little middle ground. This is because you either buy into the company and its culture or reject it outright. Seeing as I don't own a single Apple product I guess I belong to the latter group. However, even I, as a supposed hater, have been exposed to Apple's marketing machine over the last three decades. And while the ads haven't persuaded me to buy anything from the company, some have left a lasting impression.
Goodbye Couch Potato, Hello Second Screen Surfer [INFOGRAPHIC]
I immediately identified with today's infographic, provided by Realplayer, because it describes my wife and I to a tee. When we are both watching television, we are alternating between looking at the screen and looking at our phones. It's comforting to know that this is a widespread practice, and not something anti-social, as someone once told me. I wasn't listening though as I was checking my phone at the time.
Tech Company Ad Spends [INFOGRAPHIC]
Selling advertising space on the Internet is big business and this is why Google is at the top of the tech totem pole. Very early on, companies very quickly came to the conclusion that online advertising was the way to get their message out there, and if you are Google, with a huge dominant popular search engine at your disposal, then you are ideally placed to offer that advertising. Cue flowing mountains of cash.
Get the Most Out of Craigslist and Stand Out While Doing It
Craigslist has become the go-to site for anyone looking to buy, sell, hire, be hired, etc. However, at the same time, it has the reputation of attracting “sketchy” people. But this article isn’t just about using Craigslist. It’s about getting the best results, and that can be hard no matter how savvy you are. However, I have had quite a bit of success in a number of areas, which I attribute to a number of things that I have done.
How Exactly Websites Track and Stalk You With Their Ads
Privacy, privacy, privacy. The Internet is known for its anonymity. Without personal privacy, it would be a very dangerous place. But are these companies infringing on privacy rights? How exactly does a website track its users? And what do companies do with that data? Let's look into it here.
4 Alternative Models To Advertising That Are Working Right Now
Advertising shouldn't be the only way for content producers to make money. Luckily, it isn't - plenty of reputable organizations fund themselves without ads, online and off. You, the readers, had a few things to say when James called AdBlock evil and when Chris asked AdBlock users to whitelist us. Many of you understood their point of view, but one recurring theme in the comments was alternatives to advertising.
3 Tactics For Dealing With Ad-Block Users On Your Site
Leaving ethical discussions aside (since I made my views on that quite clear last time), it is nonetheless true that ad-blocking is a real problem for bloggers and site owners the world over whose only source of income is ad revenue. With that understood, let's look objectively at some tactics you can use to deal with ad-block users, and the effects those tactics might have.
Your Guide To Social Media Marketing
Right now, there is an onslaught of both people and companies turning to social media outlets. The competition is fierce, and no company can waste time or money doing it wrong.
How 3 Companies Turned Social Media PR Disasters Into Happy Endings
The Internet makes it so easy for customers to get the word out about great businesses they've found and other things they really like. Conversely, it's also quick to promote and pass around evidence of awful customer service. If you ever make a huge PR blunder, even in your bricks-and-mortar business or something more personal in nature, you can be sure someone will get proof of it online in no time.
Please Whitelist MakeUseOf In Adblock: A Plea From a Former Adblock Filter Developer
It’s no secret that we’re not huge fans of Adblock here at MakeUseOf. But we know that some of you won’t let go of Adblock until it’s pried out of your cold, dead hands. If you must use Adblock, you can still support MakeUseOf and other websites you love by whitelisting us. It's time for a truce between Adblock users and respectful advertisers.
10 Hilarious Apple Ad Parody Videos for the Non-Fanboys & Fangirls
If you're an Apple fanboy or fangirl then Apple can do no wrong. And their commercials are perfect slices of marketing genius that border on being works of art. The rest of us find most of them a little pretentious, to say the least. From the PC vs. Mac and iPod ads right through to the MacBook Air and Siri ads, all Apple commercials have a particular look and feel to them.
AdBlock, NoScript & Ghostery - The Trifecta Of Evil
Over the past few months, I've been contacted by a good number of readers who have had problems downloading our guides, or why they can't see the login buttons or comments not loading; and in 99% of cases, it's because they're running one these plugins - AdBlock, NoScript, or Ghostery - which I shall hereby refer to as the "trifecta of evil". Here's why.
3 Social Media Campaigns That Worked Their Magic On Me
What kind of socially devoid person Facebook-likes Nike or Coca Cola just to get some marketing spiel pseudo-status messages fill up their Facebook homepage? Surely this new social marketing fad is just a bunch of stale baloney? Well, I've come to the conclusion that there is some merit to it after all, so I present to you 3 social media campaigns that got me, hook, line and sinker.