Majority of Web Users Disapprove of Targeted Ads
Digital/Online
March 2012 -- Nine out of 10 online adults use search engines to find information on the web and the majority of these users do not like search engines and other websites collecting information about them and using it to either shape their search results or target advertising to them, according to data from the Pew Internet & American Life Project.
Asked specifically about targeted advertising:
-
Six out of 10 (59%) say they have noticed advertisements online that are directly related to things they had recently searched for or sites they had recently visited.
-
The demographic groups most likely to report noticing targeted advertising online are men, white Internet users, those under age 65, and those who have been to college. Online adults living in households with annual incomes of $75,000 or greater are also especially likely to notice such ads (69%) compared to households with incomes between $30,000-$49,999 (57%) and households with incomes less than $30,000 (48%).
-
When asked about targeted advertising, 68% say they “are NOT OKAY with it” because they don’t like having their online behavior tracked and analyzed.
-
On the flip side, 28% say they “are OK with targeted advertising” because it means seeing advertisements and getting information about things of interest.
- While a majority of every demographic group says they are not okay with online targeted advertising, younger internet users and those in the lowest income households are more likely than others to view the practice favorably. Yet, even among those groups, almost six in ten say they are not okay with targeted ads because they do not like having their online behavior tracked and analyzed.
About: The Pew survey conducted from January 20-February 19, 2012 among 2,253 adults age 18 and over, including 901 cell phone interviews. Interviews were conducted in English and Spanish. The margin of error for the full sample is plus or minus 2 percentage points. For results based on the total sample, one can say with 95% confidence that the error attributable to sampling is plus or minus 2 percentage points. For results based Internet users (n=1,729), the margin of sampling error is plus or minus 2.7 percentage points.
Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project, Search Engine Use 2012, March 2012.