RunawayTrader

I mean, what’s to say? The Dow is down hundreds of points, the market is crashing, and I certainly gave back everything I earned from DNDN—and a lot more.

So, easy come, easy go. Now where did I put that noose . . .

Instead, I’m writing off-topic today about a nasty little phenomena that I’m beginning to see everywhere on the net. And you’re likely to see more of it in the future.

I’m talking about cost-per-click (or its brother, cost-per-action) remarketing: a system that reaches out to surfers who have previously visited a website, and delivers advertising to them as they surf elsewhere on the web.

A Recent Example

Let’s suppose you visit the Web site of APMEX, the American Precious Metals Exchange, as I often do. I’ve bought plenty of merchandise from this company as a hedge against days just like we’re experiencing this week in the market. My experience with this company has been just great.

But, lately I’ve been noticing that APMEX banners have been appearing on all sorts of other sites that I visit. What’s going on here?

Well, here’s the scoop. When I visited the APMEX site, those dirty little cowards dropped a cookie onto my hard-drive and that tiny script generates those ads on other sites that work with these remarketers, companies that specialize in working with advertisers. They’re the middle-men who help them place those cookies on your site and then blast you with the advertiser’s messages.

I first noticed this awful business when I visited a dating site, PlentyofFish.com. The next day I started seeing their banners on news and other sites that I frequent. Since I knew that was an impossible coincidence, I removed all my cookies and voila!, the banners disappeared.

But, I opened an account with Ally Bank, and now I’m seeing their ads everywhere I surf. I do business with PR Web (a news release dissemination outfit) and now my computing surfing experience is awash with their ads.

I hate it.

I know advertisers think they’re using a “lowest hanging fruit” marketing strategy to drive sales, but let’s be honest. I’ve made a dozen purchases from APMEX. Do these fools think I’ll buy more gold just because I see their banners when I’m surfing elsewhere without regard to market conditions? Will I open another financial account at Ally when I already have one? Will I be inspired to write and send another news release just because PR Web ads are flashing before me? Not hardly. And if this keeps up I’ll start blocking cookies from my browser or wait for some inventive hacker to bring me a better solution.

In the meantime, all I got to say is I pity those poor souls who visit porn sites since their legitimate surfing experiences may soon be awash with banners of scantily-clad fems performing stuff I never write about in blogs. And won’t your wives be surprised when they surf the web looking for recipes?

One last note: I just bought an arm-load of Proctor & Gamble as a flight to safety. AMPEX, PR Web and Ally will just have to wait. I’m outta cash.