At Beyond Voter Lists, we specialize in supporting political direct marketing, especially when it come to targeted data for postal efforts. So we're happy to read that one takeaway from this year's major political marketing conferences is the continued value of direct mail. In Campaigns & Elections magazine, Elena Neely, national lead for the U.S. Postal Service® (USPS) Political Mail Outreach efforts, describes five reasons she supports that conclusion. Let's start with an obvious one: Mail is still the only campaign channel with 100% voter reach since you have to have a mailing address to register to vote. Next, direct mail is a highly targetable medium, and political campaign success today relies more on targeting specific audiences than mass marketing. The proof is in Borrell Associates’ 2016 political advertising analysis report that more targetable media, including digital, cable and direct mail, “gained $1.7 billion over 2012 spending levels while radio, TV and newspapers lost nearly $1.3 billion.” Next, direct mail retains a place in the campaign promotional mix because there just is no one-size-fits-all medium for audience targeting; as the Pew Research Center found, people are influenced by multiple information sources, with nearly half of 2016 respondents learning about the presidential race from five or more types of sources, ranging from cable television to social media to campaign e-mails. Direct mail also fits easily into a multichannel effort; for example, campaigns can use a mailer's QR code to digitally connect voters to a social media platform or campaign website. Yes, different generations and demographics respond to direct mail differently, but it works well across the board. A 2016 USPS survey not only found that 46% of baby boomers ranked mail as their preferred political ad format but younger millennials also rated political mail “important” for state elections (82%), local elections (80%) and even national races (76%). And when it comes to vital swing voters, 58% said mail was “very or somewhat helpful,” and that compares with television (55%), digital ads (48%) and e-mail (46%). Finally, as attention spans shorten and media noise escalates, direct mail can use tangible creativity to grab share of mind, with dimensional mail, audio mail and video mail as examples. For the complete article, go to https://www.campaignsandelections.com/campaign-insider/5-things-every-campaign-should-know-about-direct-mail-last-cycle
Whether you promote a cause or a candidate, Beyond Voter Lists President David Kanter's targeting tips are designed to help you win generous donors, committed special-interest group members, influential private-sector leaders, and activists across the political spectrum. We welcome sharing of your comments and success stories. Please read our Comment Policy.
Showing posts with label targeting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label targeting. Show all posts
Monday, May 22, 2017
Tuesday, February 2, 2016
Don't Let Digital Ad-Blocking Hobble Your Campaign
Ad blocking by digital and mobile viewers is a growing challenge for political campaigns and causes in the 2016 election cycle, and video ads are especially vulnerable, warns a recent AdExchanger.com post. There are already 45 million monthly active ad-blocking users in the U.S., and ad-blocker usage is growing rapidly. Ad-blocking rates vary by region, from a low of 8% in Washington, D.C. to over 14% in a swing state like New Hampshire. Besides ad blocking, voters--especially millennials--are engaging in ad skipping thanks to skippable digital ads and ad-skipping DVRs. And with ad-free digital video subscriptions, more voters are able to avoid political videos. What can campaigns do? The article suggests several strategies to dodge ad blockers and maximize the viewing run of online display, mobile and video ads. Start by asking digital content providers how they handle anti-ad blocking, such as withholding content if ads are blocked or employing a tech solution to defend agaist ad blockers. Since ad blocking rates vary by site vertical and environment, take that into account in media buys--for example, ad blockers are less effective with mobile native apps than with mobile web browsers. When it comes to video ads, go for premium viewing, such as major media and broadcast sites, to combat viewer drop off due to poor ad stream quality, overall low viewability and even fraudulent impressions. Of course, personalized targeting decreases ad avoidance, and programmatic and other precise viewer targeting can help. For the full article, go to http://adexchanger.com/politics/how-will-political-campaigns-reach-voters-who-are-avoiding-ads/
Tuesday, December 22, 2015
Avoid Pitfalls That Sap Digital Ads' Political Impact
Campaigns and causes are going to be pouring money into digital advertising in the 2016 races, with online political advertising expected to reach nearly $1 billion, over six times that of the previous presidential campaign cycle. But the power of digital advertising to reach the right person with the right message in the right environment can be undermined by a few common pitfalls, wasting precious dollars, warns a recent MediaPost article by Avi Goldwerger. For example, campaigns must realize that programmatic advertising is automated, so problems can occur when a programmatic platform is too centered on targeting user demographics and not enough on where the ad is actually placed. For example, a wholesome family-values candidate's ad focused on reaching males aged 25-54 could show up on a porn site! Campaigns need to use available tools to target the right environments on programmatic platforms and to block wrong placements across any media partner. Digital fraud and viewability are two other factors that can undermine ad effectiveness and waste dollars. Fraudulent traffic, according a recent industry report, makes up 10.9% of all traffic, warns Goldwerger. Most of the fraud is due to bot traffic (computer programs acting like humans and filling out voter forms or clicking ads) and phony Web sites. Lack of viewability, on the other hand, occurs when an ad is served to a real audience but is placed so that it remains unseen, say at the the bottom of a page where users fail to scroll down to see it. To target the 43% of digital media that will be viewed and free of fraud, Goldwerger advises campaigns to choose media sellers and programmatic platforms that operate with viewability as targeting criteria and that have media quality safeguards in place. For more, read http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/264708/digital-politics-seizing-the-right-ad-opportuni.html
Tuesday, June 2, 2015
Election Spurs Sale of Valuable Voter, Donor Data
One way presidential hopefuls raise money for 2016, and pay off debts from prior campaigns, is to rent out valuable voter and donor data. And that's a boon for other candidates and causes. "A lot of folks that ran in 2012, their lists are on the market," Ryan Meerstein, senior director for Client Strategy at Targeted Victory, a Republican tech firm, recently confirmed to The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette newspaper. Targeted Victory, for example, paid $1.1 million to rent list data from Mitt Romney's 2012 presidential bid. GOP presidential bidder Rick Santorum has earned nearly $281,000 by renting supporter lists from his 2012 election effort, while 2012 GOP also-ran Newt Gingrich has earned $434,000 off supporter lists. The most coveted data, campaign pros told the Pittsburgh newspaper, includes the personal contact information of campaign donors. Also desirable are lists of supporters "willing to turn an online action into an offline action," such as attending a rally or posting a lawn sign, added Meerstein. Of course, national candidates are not the only source of valuable political data. On the market are voters by city, state and local campaign, members of special-interest and advocacy groups, and donors to a range of politically relevant causes, with many of those lists selectable for party affiliation. Political lists are rented via data brokers, like Beyond Voter Lists, the article notes. But we would add that a good broker will help candidates and causes avoid the problems also cited in the newspaper article, such as overuse and poor targeting, by checking usage history and making sure list data is updated and matched with client targeting. See http://www.post-gazette.com/news/nation/2015/06/01/Political-fundraising-campaigns-manage-debts-by-selling-data/stories/201506010025
Tuesday, May 19, 2015
GOP Hopefuls Face Online Ad Space Sell-outs
Even before all the Republican presidential hopefuls can enter the 2016 race, the hottest online ad inventory is selling out, especially for the New Hampshire and Iowa primaries, reports the National Journal. There were digital-ad shortages ahead of the 2012 and 2014 elections, too, but not so far in advance, note political pros and online sellers like Google. But, with the summer of 2015 still ahead, winter 2016 ad inventory is booking up in this presidential race. The ads that are selling out the fastest are those that automatically play on Hulu, YouTube and other Internet-based videos that users can't skip. With a field of nearly 20 GOP candidates, and super PAC money, the ad crunch is not surprising, and Peter Pasi, now vice president of political sales at Collective and a former GOP digital ad strategist, predicts "a huge shortfall." The ad space that will be available for late arrivals includes Facebook, which sells video ads at auction, so campaigns can't lock them up in advance, and YouTube's skippable ads, which are also sold at auction. But political strategists advise conservative campaigns to grab prime ad real estate early, especially since there is little penalty for pre-buying; most ad reservations can be cancelled later at no cost or for a small fee. Perhaps just as important, campaigns are urged to use more sophisticated data targeting than in the past to make the most of scarce ad inventory, avoiding wasted dollars by serving ads only to likely caucus-goers or primary voters. "It's BYOD--bring your own data--if you will," remarks Kenny Day, head of political-advocacy sales for Yahoo. For the full story, read http://www.nationaljournal.com/2016-elections/websites-are-already-selling-out-of-ad-inventory-for-2016-20150512
Tuesday, May 12, 2015
Can Facebook Kick Up 2016 Political Donations?
Will Facebook become a more significant ingredient in the political fundraising mix of 2016 candidates and causes? Consider mid-term election research conducted by Facebook, as reported in a recent medipost.com article. Facebook tracked the Senate campaigns of Democrats Michelle Nunn of Georgia and Mark Udall of Colorado. OK, so the candidates lost, but their Facebook ads won in terms of donor power. Facebook found that not only did Facebook ads provide at least a 200% ROI but people who saw the ads gave more on average than those who did not. Specifically, people who viewed Udall's Facebook ad gave $47.87 on average, while those who did not see the ad gave an average $42.70. There are good reasons Facebook will be an attractive fundraising addition in 2016, argues a recent mediapost.com article by Shawn Kemp, co-founder of ActionSprout, which helps nonprofits optimize Facebook. Facebook has the deepest social reach: 42% of Americans have a Facebook account, compared with 19% on Twitter, the second-largest social network. Facebook offers attractive targeting options such as geo-targeting and look-alike audiences. And Facebook ads, while not a key donation driver alone, can have a multiplier effect in multi-channel efforts, as shown by Facebook's mid-term election experiments. So, for example, combining Facebook ads with an e-mail campaign to the same targeted list could boost giving per donor. For more, see http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/248996/facebook-advertising-matters-for-political-fundrai.html#
Tuesday, March 3, 2015
Despite Digital Growth, Mail Still Leads Budgets
Don't let stories about online and social media politicking distract your campaign planning from the proven direct marketing leader: direct mail. Note that direct mail will top overall marketing budgets this year despite all the chatter about e-mail and digital content, predicts the Winterberry Group. At a forecast $45.7 billion spend for 2015, direct mail is showing only a 1% growth, but that still puts mail well ahead of an expected e-mail spend of just $2.3 billion, as well search dollars of $26.9 (including desktop and mobile). Although targeted digital display, including desktop and mobile promotions, has the strongest predicted growth (21.1%), it still comes in well behind mail at $28.3 billion in projected spending. Key factors driving strong direct-mail budget plans include lack of a postal rate increase in early 2015, rising mail volumes, strong acquisition mail investment to offset declining retention mailings, and a rise in digital-to-offline retargeting, according to the Winterberry study. Direct mail may also benefit from its proven ability in data-driven targeting--the Holy Grail of today's political marketing. Across channels, Winterberry predicts that 2015 marketers will invest more in data-driven promotion, with the top reason (from 52.7% surveyed) cited as the demand for more relevant, customer-centric (read donor-centric and voter-centric) communication. For an infographic summarizing results, check out the Direct Marketing News magazine article at http://www.dmnews.com/marketing-spending-in-2015-infographic/article/400487/
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
Digital Tool Aids Low-Dollar Campaigns on Right
For just $500, a local, small-budget campaign can now use targeted digital marketing, once a campaign weapon wielded only by big-budget political rivals. Targeted Victory, the digital political marketing firm that recently helped Greg Abbott become the new Texas governor, has joined with Facebook Ads to create the Targeted Engagement platform, and is making it available to any campaign with $500 and a right-leaning agenda, reports Direct Marketing News. The new platform combines internal and external data on likely Republican voters and donors, and then uses modeling to optimize media mixes. The minimum cost is $500, although campaigns will probably need to spend more like $10,000 to really leverage the power of the platform, per Targeted Victory co-founder Michael Beach. Beach explained to DM News, "With a lot of our senatorial candidates last year, we found that we could reach 75% of target audiences on Facebook. This is a powerful tool, because it allows you to compete with smaller resources. On TV, they're missing about 30% of possible voters." The Targeted Engagement SaaS platform targets across desktop, mobile and TV, while its Facebook upgrade adds the ability to post images, links and videos with no minimum buy. See the DM News report at http://www.dmnews.com/getting-elected-just-got-cheaper/article/399071/
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Will Voters 'Like' New Facebook Political Videos?
Political campaigns expanded use of video ads on Facebook and other social platforms in 2014. But if campaigns like Facebook video, they'll have to make changes to get voters to "like" them back in 2016, according to a recent article by Derek Willis for The Upshot website of The New York Times. Previously, many political videos were just re-purposed TV ads, either run on the candidate's Facebook page or as a "pre-roll" clip before another YouTube video that users actually wanted to watch. For political video ads to really leverage social media impact, they will need to be in the "feed" as ads, and grabbing attention in just a few seconds. That means 2016 campaign videos will have to be designed specifically for the Internet rather than TV, digital ad consultants predict. Plus, while social media has a great potential audience, data shows that politically active Facebook users rarely cross party lines and mainly share with like-minded followers. So tapping the wider reach of a social network like Facebook also will mean producing more distinct online videos customized to specific audiences. "Campaigns will need to produce vast quantities of customized messaging," Connor Walsh, a Republican digital consultant, told Willis. "And with a cap on the frequency a user is shown the same ad, campaigns cannot rely on repetition to drive home their message." Instead of repetition, video content will be challenged to use a few seconds of title and image for an immediate hook that inspires engagement and sharing. Yet while grabbing viewer attention, social video content will have to straddle the line between serious policy and the over-the-top "red meat" that can backfire, especially outside the base, warn digital media experts. Clearly, winning over social networks with political videos will not be an easy task. For the whole article, read http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/05/upshot/coming-to-your-facebook-feed-more-political-videos.html
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
Political Ads Grab 20% of Sept. Cable TV Spend
With $1 of every $5 spent on cable TV advertising in September dedicated to political ads, at least per independent cable ad rep firm Viamedia, cable fans are seeing their usual beer and insurance ads pushed aside by midterm election messages this year. As reported recently by The Fix. The Washington Post political blog, the share of political ad revenue is way up this year in Viamedia stats -- compare September's 20.5% share for political ads with the 13% share of four years ago -- and still growing. Why the cable blitz? Viamedia theorized to The Fix that not only has easing of campaign finance restrictions pulled more money into political ad spending but also that data technology for cost-effective, narrow targeting of cable audience, especially geo-targeting, is drawing dollars away from broadcast. As proof of the current tightly targeted TV ad effort, Viamedia notes that just 16 channels comprise 92% of its political ad revenue in 2014. To see the cable networks leading in political ad share across 30 Viamedia markets, check out http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/10/08/1-of-every-5-spent-on-cable-tv-ads-in-september-was-political-per-one-firm/
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Data Advances Transform TV Ad Targeting, Costs
Improved data technology is revolutionizing political TV ad targeting and spending, stresses a recent report by The Wall Street Journal. Borrowing from traditional direct-mail targeting methods, data analysts now can mine information about where a person lives, how he or she has voted and what products have been purchased to predict future political behavior -- and then match those voters to TV viewer data about what shows individuals watch and when they watch them. This allows TV ad targeting to drill down to a much deeper level than blanket TV ad buys using traditional audience stats. For example, DirecTV Group Inc. and Dish Network Corp., the country's two biggest satellite-TV providers, now offer direct access to chosen households, so one person might see a campaign ad during a show that his next-door neighbor won't see even if watching the same show. Cablevision Systems Corp. and Comcast Spotlight, a division of Comcast Corp., also have started providing campaigns with detailed, real-time information about what people are watching. Sensitive to possible privacy concerns, ad buyers and sellers stressed to WSJ that individual privacy is being protected by encryption, removal of names and identifiers, and third-party matching of anonymous voter and TV viewer data. But the bottom line is that these new data tools are allowing campaigns to reach pivotal voters at lower TV-ad costs. Advocates of the new TV targeting for both Republicans and Democrats told WSJ that they can help a campaign stretch its ad budget by as much as 30%. That's certainly good news when political campaigns will spend about 57% of their overall advertising budgets on broadcast TV, and another 15% on cable, according to projections by Kantar Media's Campaign Media Analysis Group! For examples of how real campaigns have used the new TV targeting, read the WSJ story: http://online.wsj.com/articles/political-ads-take-targeting-to-the-next-level-1405381606
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Dish, DirecTV Unite on Addressable Political TV Ads
Satellite TV giants Dish Network and DirecTV are teaming their sales efforts to offer addressable TV ads for political campaigns this election year, creating a combined reach of more than 20 million households. Political campaigns now will be able to use both operators' addressable capabilities to target at a household level. "The DirecTV/Dish addressable advertising platform utilizes highly sophisticated and targeted technology that will allow political campaigns to specifically reach swing voters with TV ads. Campaigns can focus their message to a precise set of potential voters and eliminate the spending waste," Keith Kazerman, senior VP of ad sales at DirecTV, said in a statement. "The platform not only uniquely monetizes big data, which has become critical to every political campaign, but it does it at scale. It’s the perfect complement to local DMA cable buys and a fiscally compelling alternative to local broadcast." Warren Schlichting, senior VP of Dish media sales, was quoted as adding, "Together, Dish and DirecTV reach nearly one out of every five U.S. television households and usher TV into the modern political age." See the story at http://www.multichannel.com/distribution/dish-directv-team-addressable-political-ads/147908
Tuesday, December 3, 2013
Data-Fueled Targeting Is Redefining TV Political Ads
Data-centric political ad targeting -- which transformed digital politicking -- began redefining TV ad campaigns in 2013. Traditionally, political campaigns buy TV spots based on ratings data, such as the demographics of the core viewers of a show. Now, by combining voter data with set-top box data, campaigns can better segment TV audience voters. Firms are sprouting up to serve the new age of voter-data-fueled TV, especially since TV buys take the lion's share of political ad budgets. A recent Ad Age article surveyed some in the forefront of TV targeting, including Rentrak, a firm that provides local and national TV data on 12 million households from its partners in cable, satellite and telecom, and which worked with the Obama for America campaign last year. Rentrak claims it actually did more political business in 2013 with just a handful of gubernatorial, mayoral and down-ballot races. Using an outside firm (Experian in 2013), Rentrak matched TV-subscriber data to voter-file data from the campaigns and their parties to produce anonymized audience segments that categorize voters according to interests, likelihood to vote and political leanings. An example of the new trend in TV ad buying: Democrat Terry McAuliffe's winning Virginia gubernatorial effort spent around 25% of its persuasion-ad budget (ads intended to sway voters rather than generate fundraising) on ads targeted via voter-file matching and purchased through exchanges and automated TV-buying platforms, as opposed to ads with traditional behavioral or demographic targeting. For more, see http://adage.com/article/news/data-redefining-political-tv-ads/245286/
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Obama's Former Data Team Sells Secret TV Formula
Now that some Obama campaign senior data whizzes have left politics to chase corporate cash cows with the newly formed Analytics Media Group (AMG) ad agency, they are pulling back the curtain on the campaign’s secret, technologically advanced formulas for reaching a target TV audience -- and political marketers will want take a closer look. Check out a recent New York Times article on AMG and the "secret sauce" that revolutionized television-ad buying, where over $400 million, or about 50% of the campaign’s budget, was spent. Previous campaigns made decisions on television-ad budgets based on hunches and deductions about what channels target voters were watching, partly based on broad viewership ratings of Nielsen and survey data, which typically led to buying relatively expensive ads during evening-news and prime-time viewing hours. The 2012 campaign combined its vast voter and social media data with advanced set-top-box monitoring technology to target voters, resulting in a smarter and cheaper — and potentially more invasive — way to beam commercials into homes. For more, see the New York Times article at http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/23/magazine/the-obama-campaigns-digital-masterminds-cash-in.html?pagewanted=all
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
The Obama Marketing Machine Keeps Rolling
The election is over, but Obama's "big data" juggernaut keeps rolling. Al Urbanski, a senior writer at "Direct Marketing News," marvels at the barrage of e-mail messages he has gotten from the Obama team post-election. "It's like the election never ended. He and his people still have their lists, their website and their e-mail machine cranking. Obama & Co. remains a going concern," comments Urbanski. Regular e-mails now seek to enlist support for the President's agenda -- his new product launches, so to speak -- while barackobama.com still solicits contributions (to settle campaign debt) and gathers data to grow the Democrats' 40 million-name political database. The White House "marketing" team is calling on retail marketing strategies to keep that data working for them, apparently. Urbanski quotes Jimmy Duval, head of product management at Magento, an Ebay-owned platform that manages Obama's website as well as sites for Nike, Office Max, etc.: "They're using common retail strategies. This person bought a poster; let's sell her an inaugural item. Forget exit polls; this is what actually happened. It will be interesting to see how Obama will parlay this information into the next election." For the complete Urbanski article, go to http://www.dmnews.com/marketing-obama-co/article/278459/
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Obama Victory Has Nonprofit Measurement Lesson
Nonprofit organizations can learn a lot from the way the Obama campaign approached performance measurement, argues a recent blog in the "Stanford Social Innovation Review." Here are what the authors see as the key lessons from President Obama's successful election effort: focusing on cost-per-outcome; using the best research and expertise to design campaigns; segmenting and micro-targeting voters and donors; investing in a cross-functional data system; and making measurement a priority investment. The blog article concludes with a question: "What do you believe it will take for nonprofits to follow a similar course in their measurement approaches?" To simply answer "more money" can be self-defeating, so we would pose the challenge as how spending can be reallocated for more effective data and performance measurement. For the complete discussion, go to http://www.ssireview.org/blog/entry/what_obamas_campaign_can_teach_nonprofits_about_measurement
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Some Tips for Capturing 'Millennial' Donors
A new generation of potential donors, the so-called "millennials" born between 1980 and 2000, is awaiting your non-profit message. They are 80 million strong and promising more spending power than previous generations by 2017, but they aren't going to necessarily respond to the tried-and-true tactics of the past. A recent "The Buzz Bin" blog post by Rachel Seda outlined some ways to lure this generation of tech-savvy young people. They are definitely open to charitable and political appeals: A 2010 survey found 93% of millennials reported giving to a cause, Seda points out. But they have definite preferences on approach. The successful fundraiser will embrace social media and mobile giving (almost half of their direct donations come via mobile device). The message needs to be simple and relevant, the call-to-action clear and easy to execute, and your response immediate -- because these folks move at the speed of Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest. You will need to tap emotions, create a message they want to share, and ask for involvement not just money to play successfully in millennials' online and offline social space, Seda suggests. For the full blog post, go to http://www.crttbuzzbin.com/5-things-nonprofits-must-do-to-captivate-millennials/
Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Making 2013 Fundraising Resolutions? Try These
If you're hoping to boost nonprofit fundraising results in 2013, you've probably made some strategic marketing resolutions already. But here are five suggestions from Taylor Corrado of Hubspot's Inbound Internet Marketing Blog to check against your own to-do list: E-mail once a month (keeping in touch without pestering); start blogging (engaging your audience while boosting SEO); use Facebook in campaigning (because 67% of 20- to 35-year-olds interacted with a nonprofit on Facebook in 2012); optimize website navigation (making it easier to participate and donate); and segment your donor list (targeting to generate response). It's a simple but ambitious list if you consider the challenges of executing each effectively. For some "how to" ideas, read the full article at http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/33984/5-Resolutions-to-Amplify-Your-Nonprofit-s-2013-Fundraising-Strategy.aspx
Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Data Was the Biggest Winner in the 2012 Election
The 2012 election demonstrated, beyond a doubt, the power of using data and analytics in political campaigning. A new generation of data crunchers, predictive modelers and online marketers emerged triumphant, outflanking supposed political masterminds like Karl Rove to more accurately take the pulse of the electorate, get out the vote and raise money, opines Rio Longacre in a recent "Target Marketing" magazine column. Longacre remarks that "there's no doubt in anyone's mind that for data-driven marketers, the 2012 U.S. election victory was a watershed moment in history." If the "secret sauce" behind Obama's win was his massive data effort, the master chefs were a new cadre of data techs. Obama relied on an in-house team of data scientists and online marketers, recruiting elite and senior tech talent from Twitter, Google, Facebook, Craigslist and Quora, as Longacre points out. Because of their success, expect to see "data" driving political campaigning in more new and exciting directions. For the full article, see http://www.targetmarketingmag.com/blog/winner-2012-presidential-election-data#
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Election Took Online Targeting to a New Level
Isn't it ironic that the Obama administration, which threatens regulation to protect online privacy, pushed online targeting to a whole new level to win re-election? Gordon Crovitz, a Wall Street Journal" columnist, makes that point in a recent piece on how politicians are now leveraging massive databases for online "hypertargeting." First, like commercial online advertisers, a political campaign drops a "cookie" on user computers to track online habits -- and the Obama team dropped 87 million different cookies on unsuspecting visitors, Crovitz notes. Then, like sophisticated online retailers, online activity data is enhanced by demographics (like sex and age) and purchase behaviors (like charity donations). Finally, the data is politically enriched by publicly available voter records. And don't forget the trove of data mined from social media. And yet the same politicians talk about regulating commercial data usage! It would be less hypocritical and more economically sensible, as Crovitz argues, for the winner of the White House to "give credit to how his campaign made smart use of targeted advertising online -- and then let the Internet continue to evolve without getting in the way." To read the WSJ column, see http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204846304578096982338148870.html
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)