There’s a lot of buzz about the digital marketing,
behavioral tracking and consumer privacy. I think companies need to be
respectful of consumer’s privacy. Although
I’m an advertising student, I’m very guarded about my privacy when it comes to advertising.
I definitely have the privacy on my iPhone set to “Limit Ad Tracking”, and I
clear cookies from my web browser regularly. I know that my data is out there,
but I try to have some control over what I share.
As someone in the marketplace, I follow brands on Twitter. I
rarely follow brands on Facebook. I actually think I recently cleared my likes
to just 3 companies that I trust. I recently “liked” a Facebook page and took a
quiz for this brand as part of a class assignment. Within 30 minutes of this, I
started to be served ads in my newsfeed for this company. I immediately “un-liked” the company. I’m okay with being served an ad, but if it’s
taking over my newsfeed, I’m done with the company.
I also won’t use apps
or online tools that ask for too much of my information or my permission to
post on Facebook or Twitter on my behalf. No thanks! However, I understand the
need for marketers and advertisers to gain insights from personal data in order
to better target their customer segment. I do appreciate personalization and
relevant ads, but I just don’t want my privacy to feel invaded. There’s a
delicate balance to maintain between gaining valuable insights while still
respecting an individual’s privacy.
I decided to take a Digital Metrics course this semester to become
more knowledgeable about web analytics and behavioral tracking. My knowledge was minimal going into this
course, but I wanted to understand how my online and offline behaviors were
being tracked. I also wanted to understand how to be a better advertiser
because data driven advertising and marketing campaigns provide metrics and
insights into the effectiveness of the campaign. We’ve looked into some interesting metrics
this semester, and I’ll further delve into that later in this blog post.
I think marketers can use insights about people if they are
transparent about how and where this data is used. I think most people assume that we are
tracked when we make purchases online. However, tracking behavior for insights
spans beyond the web to include in-store retailers. This isn’t something people
always expect or know about. Personally, I find it creepy if you don’t know you’re
being tracked in-store.
We were asked to discuss whether there should be a limit to
all of our efforts as marketers or whether it is fair game to gather insights
from people who share their information with us through various platforms. I’m
going to discuss my opinion by each popular tracking platform.
Surveys
If you decide to take a survey, I think you realize that
your personal data is going to be used. I think surveys should be responsible
for being upfront with exactly how your data is used and whether your identity
will remain confidential. I typically don’t take surveys for companies, but
will take them for my graduate friends conducting research. My insurance
company sends me surveys, and I actually will take them. I assume they have so
much of my information already, but they have given me such great customer
service that I want to give them good feedback. I had my phone stolen last year
(talk about a freak out over someone else having all your data), but my
renter’s insurance completely covered it. My insurance company was also
extremely prompt and helpful during this time. I received a check in the mail
and was able to purchase a new phone within a few days. If a company provides a great customer
experience, I don’t mind if they have more of my personal data. I think
customers will be more likely to share their information if they have a
positive experience with the company.
Social Media
If
you are using a platform where your information is public (Twitter, Facebook,
LinkedIn), I think this is fair game for marketers to pull this data. On
Facebook, I put where I have that I’m a graduate student at UT in my about
section. I’ve noticed more UT apparel ads since adding this. If I’m served ads
that are relevant to me, I don’t mind them as much.
However,
The Wall Street Journal article that we read for class – They Know What You’re
Shopping For highlights how Facebook data can match people’s identities with
their web browsing activities. This article also stated that the “Like” button
can send information back to Facebook whenever Facebook users visit pages that
have the button, even if they don’t click it.
Facebook
also lets advertisers know how Facebook ads increased sales – whether products
were purchased online or offline. Facebook works with a company (Datalogix)
that controls a database of information from people’s use of loyalty card
programs.
They Know What
You’re Shopping For article also stated “Google
said it keeps its social-networking data separate from its ad-tracking network
and doesn't use the data from unclicked Google+ buttons. Twitter says it
analyzes the data from its unclicked buttons to recommend other people a user
might want to follow, but not for other purposes. Facebook says it uses data
from unclicked "Like" buttons only for security purposes and to fix bugs
in its software.”
As an
advertiser, I think it’s awesome that Facebook can link online and offline
sales to an ad. This is a great metric to be able to provide because it doesn’t
seem like many other companies are able to currently do this accurately. As a
consumer, this doesn’t seem nearly as awesome. I also don’t think many
consumers are aware that their web browsing activities can be paired with their
Facebook data. I think the content
consumers provide to social media sites are fair game for marketers to target,
but I think a consumer’s activities beyond the social media site seem more
personal and invasive to privacy. I believe consumers should always be able to
opt-in or opt-out of sharing their data.
Mobile
With the majority of people carrying their cell phone with
them at all times, mobile is an attractive place to track people. As
advertisers, we talk about location-based advertising and geo-fences as a means
of influencing purchases by pushing discounts. I think these types of
advertisements should only be used if consumers opt-in. Otherwise, I think it’s
creepy and is invasive to privacy. Mobile payments have also become popular,
and there are more means of mobile tracking.
Another article we read for class The Economics of
Surveillance by Jennifer Valentino-Devries calls cellphones as a personal sensor
that you carry with you at all times. iBeacon technology, discussed below,
talks more about how this sensor is used for in-store purchases.
Shopping Online
Whenever I shop online, and abandon my shopping cart, I
always seem to get ads that follow me around the Internet. I also get sent
emails like “Limited time offer for the item you were just looking at.” As a
consumer, I expect to be tracked. Although I may be annoyed that ads follow me
around the web or into my inbox, I’m more aware of the tracking that takes
place.
As an advertiser, online tracking proves the effectiveness
of a campaign and an e-commerce website. Key Performance Indicators such as the
bounce rate, unique visitors, conversion rate and time on site are all valuable
in optimizing a website.
Shopping In-store
With in-store shopping, I realize that there is in-store
surveillance. I also realize that the company has my data when I opt-in to a
loyalty program. However, I would not expect to have a mannequin spying on me. As
a consumer, I found the Bionic Mannequins Spy on Shoppers to Boost Luxury Sales
extremely creepy. Unless the company is
transparent about this, I feel like consumers will lose trust in the company. It
also raises ethical and probably legal questions. Consumers don’t know exactly
how their data is being used, and haven’t consented to this type of tracking.
Another interesting in-store tracking mechanism that has
been in the news lately is Apple’s iBeacon. This technology could replace near
field communication (NFC) where consumers could use an online wallet to make a
payment in-store. iBeacon uses Bluetooth, and iPhones with iOS7 can use this
technology.
Apple’s Secret Retail Weapon Is Already in Your Pocket by
Sam Grobart of BloombergBusinessweek further discuses iBeacon technology. This
sums up the use of the new technology:
“Now
a store could tell if you’ve walked in. Once you have, it could, if you wanted
it to, alert you to what was on sale in that location. Not only that, but if
you said, “Yeah, that sweater looks boss, and I dig that it’s 30 percent off.
Where is that fly garment?” that store’s app, with an assist from iBeacon,
could guide you right to it. With stored credit-card information on your phone,
payment could also be conducted via iBeacon. Your phone wouldn’t even have to
leave your pocket for the transaction to take place.”
This type of technology would really track a consumer both
on a mobile device and in-store. Consumers might be willing to give up more of
their personal information for the sake of convenience. I’m curious to see what
happens when this technology is out in the marketplace. I would probably try to
use this if I knew it my privacy and security wasn’t at stake.
Overall
I think consumers and companies (marketers/advertisers) have
a responsibility in protecting data. I believe consumers need to protect their
privacy by opting-out of programs they don’t wish to be a part of. I also think
consumers should be aware of the different types of behavioral tracking in the
marketplace. I think that marketers and advertisers bear the most
responsibility. Although it is important to track people to gain insights,
there must be ethical ways to do so. Companies shouldn’t be able to sell data to
third parties, or use data beyond how they stated they would. Anonymity is
still imperative to consumers, and there should be regulations on companies to
ensure personal information isn’t revealed. Digital advertising has taken off
in the last decade, and I’m interested to see what the next decade brings in
terms of standards for behavioral tracking.
References & Interesting Articles about Behavioral
Tracking:
References:
Martinez,
J. (2010). Can Marketers Behave Themselves?. CRM Magazine, 14(5),
16.
In-store
analytics. Double standard online offline.
Shelton, D. (2012, September-October). Online behavioral
advertising: tracking users: gold mine or land mine? Landslide, 5(1),
26+. Retrieved from http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA317596852&v=2.1&u=txshracd2598&it=r&p=AONE&sw=w&asid=391d757940a3ba0005ab1f56774de38b
Wow, Megan - this was awesome. You covered so much territory here and it was all very well organized and written. You definitely have a good grasp of the breadth of issues on this and it's clear you've done a lot of reading in this area. Great job!
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