Marketers working hard to market using data captured though sales and social media.
This week KLM Dutch Airlines thrust Adaptive Marketing into the headlines with its announcement that it was working on a program to allow customers to use social media like Facebook to choose who they would like to sit with on a flight. It's an interesting concept and actually not that difficult to implement. Many travelers already use the internet to purchase their tickets and choose their seats. Airlines have been working hard to increase their presence in social media and millions of travelers use Facebook or Linked-in. KLM found in their research that a large group of travelers like to flirt on flights. This leads them to believe that facilitating social interaction on flights might be good for business. Or not. Most flights these days are full and once in the air, the likelihood of changes seats is low. Airlines are not equipped to handle multiple passenger request to move seats. Unless both passengers agree, there might be some sticky legal issues involved with taking the randomness out of seat assignments. While the idea of connecting travelers through social media might not fly, it is clear that marketers are looking for and will increasingly find ways to make use of technology and the great wealth of data that can be culled, compared and matched to give them the ability to connect to consumers in new ways. This is Adaptive Marketing: enhancing traditional marketing with information gained through technology. It is in its infancy, but it is everywhere. Amazon uses it to suggest books based on what you purchase and look at while on their site. Domino's Pizza allows you to virtually follow your pizza being made and track it to your house. Coke is testing vending machines that allow you to customize the combination of flavors you want to drink. But it's deeper than all of this. We have presented a concept to General Motors to help them utilize the data they already have. Imagine going on vacation and renting a car. When you credit card is swiped, you have effectively provided preliminary credit information a well as your address. after driving the car on your vacation which amounts to a test drive, you return the car. We've suggested a perforated section at the bottom of your receipt that would list a few local dealers as well as a coupon for a pre-determined rebate on the car model, if purchased within the next 90 days. We've also counseled a few professional sports teams on how to look at their entire, nationwide fan base, not just those in their immediate area. Imagine marketing apparel not just to the million fans that come to your stadium but to the 25 million fans that follow you across the country. Adaptive marketing involves collecting, organizing and mining the data as well as extending advertising and marketing messages into building communities using social media and gleaned information about customers. It also involves listening very carefully as the consumers talks about you when you're not in the room. We call that "pillow talk" and have developed an ethnograhic research tool of the same name.
We're entering into a brave new world where soon advertisers will know way too much about us and have way too many avenues for reaching us even when we are in places we consider off-limits to commercial messages. Marketers who crack the code on how to get information and use it to give customers what they want when they want it will gain exponentially. Marketers who use the data to find you with heavy-handed and intrusive messages when and where you don't want them will be penalized by the loss of sales and customer goodwill.
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