Companies spend hundreds of millions on them because they don't work.

I find this so stupid. Yes some people are not influenced by ads. I don't shop at a food store due to its ads. I never saw an ad for a steamdeck or an acer laptop. I don't eat fastfood now due to expense but the ads did nothing more than at best tell me of some new item which I might try. Im looking around my house and I can't think of any ad that correlates to the stuff I own. By and large everything was comparison shopped for aspects I wanted vs price.