Use Computer Preferences to Overcome Ad Avoidance
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By Accenture Technology Lab   
Monday, 14 May 2007
smc Advertisers must continuously adapt their techniques to ensure they provide entertaining, informative and relevant advertising that consumers will choose not to miss.
Advertisers must continuously adapt their techniques to ensure they provide entertaining, informative and relevant advertising that consumers will choose not to miss.
Do-not-disturb call lists, fast-forwarded and time-shifted television – these are examples of the ever-changing tools and techniques that consumers use to block and avoid advertising. As a result, advertisers must continuously adapt their techniques to ensure they provide entertaining, informative and relevant advertising that consumers will choose not to miss.

Today, digital set-top boxes, in-store sensors and global positioning systems allow companies to capture customer preferences and behavioral data in real time. Advances in customer analytics and digital media delivery make it possible to create immediate messages and offers that literally anticipate and respond to consumer needs or interests virtually anywhere. For companies that advertise directly to consumers, these technologies will enable intensely personalized and highly effective marketing that has the potential to revolutionize customer interactions and improve business performance.

Measuring Customer Insight
Customer insight can help marketers interact with their customers profitably – if they ask the right questions. For example: What are the consumer’s interests and preferences? What message will most likely engage the consumer in a dialogue? When is the consumer most receptive to engaging in a dialogue?

Although these questions are hardly new, it was previously impossible to systematically determine the answers in real time and create a customized marketing message that could be delivered, instantaneously and directly, to the customer via television or in-store digital displays. Both new and existing customer relationships can benefit from these kinds of interaction. More tailored, timely and interactive messages should decrease the amount of marketing needed to convert a prospect, resulting in lower costs per new customer and higher response rates.

Even more importantly, innovative companies that build a timely, relevant, anticipatory dialogue with existing customers should be better-positioned to capture a greater share of the wallet, improve loyalty and increase the customer’s lifetime value.

Continuing research into the characteristics of high-performance businesses has demonstrated that information technology can be used as a tool to create more-effective business models. Researchers and customer relationship management experts – in collaboration with industry thought leaders – are exploring how emerging customer analytics and digital media delivery can be used to solve advertising-avoidance challenges.

To help companies envision and evaluate conversational marketing innovations, researchers have developed a number of scenarios and prototypes. This work builds on existing customer relationship management tools such as data warehousing, customer analytics and campaign management. Specifically, researchers are looking at how new technologies could augment existing systems by providing companies with cost-effective methods to get closer to customers in real time, with relevant messages, at the time and place of the customer’s choosing, while respecting the customer’s privacy.

Instant messaging (IM) is an example of a popular technology that could be used to elicit information from customers who might make their activities and interests known in exchange for value-added services. A “reality instant messaging” prototype takes advantage of an emerging consumer trend – chatting online while watching TV – to improve advertising effectiveness.

Such an innovation would work in the following way: As a viewer watches a reality TV show, the TV network offers the opportunity to join in a chat with an automated IM buddy designed specifically for that television show. The viewer can see which of his or her “real” IM buddies are also in the chat room and watching the show, thereby enhancing the social aspect of instant messaging. The automated buddy would offer incentives to participate in contests and provide trivia nuggets to keep the chat entertaining, as well as extend targeted offers; e.g., “Did you know that the celebrity judge is wearing a dress designed by … ?”

Advertisers could benefit by gathering real-time insights into customers’ interests, as well as by promoting their products through this popular, targeted channel. Another example of how advertisers can harness online consumer behavior is the peer-to-peer advertising prototype. This builds on the viral marketing concept of forwarded e-mail messages.

For instance, an innovative marketing campaign could start with an entertaining TV commercial, which is also made available on a Web site or personal video recorder. Viewers would be invited to personalize a specific portion of the ad with a photo or message – software could prohibit inserting words or images that might tarnish the brand – and then pass the message on to a friend.

The friend would be more likely to pay attention to the ad because a peer personalized the message and passed it along by “word of mouse.” Advertisers could track the ad’s journey and build more-detailed customer profiles. Companies could more accurately measure the effectiveness of the ad campaign.

Personalized TV Ads
Much attention was initially focused on the ability of a personal video recorder to fast-forward through television commercials. However, the same technology that makes it possible for consumers to fast-forward also allows them to pause, rewind and record. The advertising and television programming industry is exploring new ways to engage consumers in a dialogue via the television.

For example, a real-time television content platform prototype explores how the convergence of video gaming consoles (such as Xbox and PlayStation 2), personal video recorders (such as TiVo) and digital program insertion can be used to deliver personalized content to a specific television within an individual household. TV commercials would showcase products – for example, a car – as they always have. However, interested viewers could use an advanced remote control to change the vehicle’s options and accessories. They could pause the television program they were watching until ready to resume viewing. The next time they see the commercial, the car will appear with the options they selected. This makes the ad a more personalized and effective sales tool.

A New Kind of Retail
Studies show consumers spend less time shopping and make more buying decisions at the point of sale. This means that shopper loyalty cards hold great potential to enable innovative point-of-sale marketing applications. For example, they could be used to deliver tailored in-store pitches as demonstrated by the personalized video display prototype.

On entering a store, customers would “ask” for their personalized ads by swiping their loyalty card in front of a digital promotional display, or by just walking up to it, in the case of a radio frequency identification-enabled card. Customers could use handheld devices, kiosks or large-screen displays to retrieve information they may have saved while surfing the Web, such as product comparisons or shopping lists.

In addition to tailoring offers to individuals, sensors could help retailers track traffic in front of dynamic promotions. The format and content of the product messages and the videos on these displays could be changed in real time as individuals linger and appear receptive to receiving additional information.

Building Trust
As companies leverage technology to create relevant, real-time consumer dialogues, they must also be prepared to address their customers’ expectations for privacy and protection from misuse of their personal data. The organizations that are most successful in overcoming privacy concerns are those that develop a deep level of trust among their customers – one that goes well beyond the basic trust that underpins business.

Companies that can establish a reputation for providing valuable services while using personal and proprietary data in trustworthy ways have significant advantages in the marketplace. Their brands are more valuable, and they have more opportunities to attract and retain lifetime customers, which will help them outpace the competition and improve business performance in the years to come. USBR

This article was authored by the staff of the Accenture Technology Lab in Chicago. Contact: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
 
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