Instagram’s New Ads Will Remind You of All the Products You Didn’t Buy

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You know those Facebook ads that magically flood your feed with all the various online purchases you've been contemplating? The ones that seriously test your shopping willpower? Get ready to start seeing those ads on Instagram, too.

Facebook is rolling out its "dynamic ads" to Instagram (which it also owns). The creepily personalized ads are being sold to retailers on Instagram's blog as a way to "promote the right products to the right person at the right time."

Instagram describe it like this for e-commerce companies: "When someone visits your website or mobile app, then later looks at Instagram, they’ll be served an ad featuring multiple, related products from ones they were browsing on your site or app."

Instagram is claiming too that its data shows that shoppers are always on its platform. (We have no idea what they're talking about...) Shoppers — defined as people who actively browse retailers’ sites and search for products — visit Instagram six out of seven days of the week. They also consume two times more content than non-shoppers, says the app.

The move comes amid other recent changes from Instagram. Today, the app switched its logo from an old-school camera to a neon square (which a few people hate), and there was a huge uproar in March when users thought Instagram would immediately change its feed from reverse chronological order to Facebook-style sorting via algorithm.

But like all social media sites, one of Instagram's ultimate goals involves becoming even more shoppable.

Here's an example of the new "dynamic" ads you might see on Instagram:

Photo: Instagram