They're watching you

As a final blog I would like to make a conclusion about what I learned of targeting advertising. First of all some advantages. Nobody likes to much ads , so if companies can define ads who are interesting for us we can get out of a world where we get spammed with commercials. A second reason why I think that targeting advertising can be a good thing is that sometimes it can be fun to get to know new things that you otherwise wouldn't have known. But the obvious reason why people dislike the idea of this new concept is our privacy. As an example if you are looking at some you tube videos you regularly get ads which they think are something you would like.. this because they remembered what videos you looked at before.. the idea that people know what you are looking at is a perverse concept. Personally I would like a way in between. Making sure my privacy is safe but also get ads that are interesting for myself. 

Wout steenacker

The effects of advertisement on children

Companies are competing every day against other companies to sell their products on the market with the highest profit. They need to maintain their advertisement and use different strategies to attract customers. A well-known strategy is advertising on children. Firms use all kind of stuff like colours, animals and toys to attract children for their commercial or advertisement. I don’t want to talk about specific companies; I just want to point out the effects of advertisement on children. As we all know, there are positive and negative effects. Advertisement can increase children’s knowledge and can help children in a good way. When firms promote vegetables in a good and attractive way, children would eat them more. Children can be very convincing and that’s rather negative. Companies can take advantage of their convincing character. Also junk foods are heavily promoted during children’s TV viewing time.

In my point of view, companies will never stop making advertisement, especially on children. It’s the task of the parents to undertake action and to convince their children what’s good and what’s bad.  

http://lifestyle.iloveindia.com/lounge/effects-of-advertising-on-children-4751.html

Gilles Stevens

Does targeting push the limits of privacy?

Big social networks, like facebook or even google, make a lot of money by allowing advertisements on their site. Almost all of these ads are targeted. But how far can these ads push the limits of privacy?

Facebook is probably the most known and the most popular social network that you’ll find on the internet today. However, you gotta look out about what you put on facebook about yourself, because facebook uses every piece of information to target their users. Although facebook will never share personal information with advertisers, you might give away personal information, without you realising, by clicking on the advertisements. Say for example that a gay person has put on his profile that he is gay. He will then get different kinds of ads displayed on his screen than a straight guy. By clicking on these advertisement he might reveal his sexuality by default.

I can’t agree with this form of advertising. I really do think it pushes the limits of privacy. Especially when individuals have no idea they are giving away personal information.

Maxime Ossieur

http://www.allfacebook.com/facebook-targeted-ads-privacy-2010-10

Marketing strategies

In my first and second blog I talked about iAd and The American Girl. These are examples of niche or concentration marketing. They were both invented for one particular, well-defined group of costumers, called a niche. IAd for Apple users and The American Girl for children, particularly girls.

Undifferentiated or mass marketing is a second targeting strategy.  Coca-Colas original marketing strategy was based on this form. They used to sell one product to the entire market in the hope that a sufficient amount of buyers would be attracted.

The third and last targeting strategy I’d like to talk about is differentiated or selective marketing. Companies try to invent products that match the needs of customers. An advantage is the increase of customer satisfaction and a disadvantage is that people will get confused more easily.

My opinion is that concentration marketing is one of the best marketing strategies you will find. Each firm can choose the size of their target group, the prices of their products and still they can provide customer satisfaction. 

http://tutor2u.net/business/marketing/segmentation-targeting-strategies.html

Gilles Stevens

The importance of branding

In addition to my previous blog about neuromarketing, I would like to write something about branding, which is in my opinion a subject that’s very interesting and can be linked up with targeting advertising.

The aim of neuromarketing is to create and investigate products, services but also advertisements that stimulate the brain (reactions) of a potential buyer. As a result that the target consumer would prefer to buy your product instead of the similar product of your competitor. It has been proved that these kind of stimulations can be provoked by branding for example by using a strong brand name (e.g. Coca Cola versus Pepsi) or a logo or slogan that everybody recognizes and people always associate it with a particular brand.

It seems to me that a brand is more than just a name of a company/product, people link it up with quality and the good experiences they had with this product/service so they love to buy/use it again. But I’m also convinced that branding can deceive people. A standard consumer is persuaded by the brand name only, therefore they forget that the product isn’t that good but just want to buy it because it’s recognizable and well know in society.

Andy Warhol criticized this phenomenon in his pop art:

Jolien Tortelboom

http://www.neurosciencemarketing.com/blog/topics/branding

Neuromarketing

As already mentioned, it is necessary that companies invest in research into the interest of their target consumer.  These researches can go very far in using modern technologies e.g. neuromarketing.

 Neuromarketing is a new objective technology used to penetrate the brain or subconsciousness of a human consumer, so they can explore in what way a potential buyer is reacting to a new product or advertising commercial. Believers of the neuromarketing are convinced that people make decisions in split seconds in the emotional part of their brain without knowing.  By investigating in how they can stimulate and maybe change these reactions, they are able to develop products or ads that better meet with market and consumer needs.

This new science maybe seem very interesting and effective but also has his bad aspects. From my point of view these kind of researches has reached their limits in a way that they can sell every reasonable consumer endless products (‘crap’) without we even need them. I’m also convinced that the costs of these researches overlaps the final benefits they can get from this strategy.

http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/kevin-randall/integrated-branding/neuromarketing-hope-and-hype-5-brands-conducting-brain-resear

Jolien Tortelboom

Advertising agencies

It shouldn’t strike you, as a reader, that a lot of the advertising isn’t done by the company itself . Many companies will just hire the service of an advertising agency or ad agency.

Ad agencies work completely independent from their clients. They are specialized in creating all sorts of advertisements for  the demanding companies. Besides from the obvious tasks like creating advertisements, ad agencies also handle overall marketing, branding strategies and sales promotions for their clients. There are a lot of different types of ad agencies. Ranging from one or two-person shops, usually freelancers, to enormous multi-agency conglomerates such as WPP Group and Publicis.

I think that in order to have a successful advertising campaign, it is a necessity for all companies to hire the service of an ad agency. Companies should focus on their bigger issues. Ad agencies are specialized in creating ads so they will most likely do a better job.

Maxime Ossieur

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advertising_agencies

The American Girl

New York, the city that never sleeps. In every street and on each corner you’ll find people trying to sell something. I have chosen one store in particularly, named ‘The American Girl’. We all know that children, girls especially, are found of dolls. When you enter the store you will see dolls in every colour and measurement. You can buy your doll clothes like bedtime wear, costumes, sportswear, swimwear, shoes and socks, but also furniture and accessories. You can even choose your dolls haircut and you can eat with your doll on the top floor. The most important dolls in the store are the historical characters. Their clothing and accessories teach children about the history of America.

I have been to this store and I can tell you that this is one of the best advertising stunts I’ve ever seen. Children are very convincing towards parents and ‘The American Girl’ takes advantage of it. Besides the amount of advertising it is good that children also learn about the history of America.

http://store.americangirl.com/agshop/static/home.jsp

Gilles Stevens

Upper Class advertising

In my opinion it would be interesting to take a look at another example of targeting advertising.

We all know them : they are rich , fancy and will buy only the most exclusive and expansive things. The upper class! They are one of the most easy preys for big advertising wolfs. Because they have a lot of tools to promote the luxury lifestyle.

First of all upper class magazines which is their most genius weapon. Combining expansive, exclusive products in a book which only the upper class are able to afford. But this is not their only weapon , because when these people are looking to buy a Bentley they immediately get information about  Breitling’s and so one... .These are only some of the numerous examples of companies with exclusive products who advertise at places where only their consumers , the elite , will come. The high class is one of the audiences at wich targeting advertising is used the most. Giving us a schoolbook example of targeting advertising

Wout Steenacker

Contextual targeting

Just like behavioral targeting, contextual targeting is a form of targeting advertising. Unlike behavioral targeting, which displays info based on the behavior of an individual, contextual targeting displays content that is related to the content of the website the individual is currently browsing.

When browsing, a contextual targeting system scan will scan the text of the website and look for keywords. Based on those keywords ads will be displayed on the website as a pop-up or as a banner. This technique has made an enormous impact on the earnings of many websites, because the advertisements are much more targeted and thus have a much higher chance to be clicked.

My opinion hasn’t change all that much since my last blog. I understand the need of the companies to try and reach their customers, but I would rather not be bothered with that kind of advertising.


Maxime Ossieur

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contextual_advertising

Behavioral targeting

As mentioned in one of our previous blogs, behavioral targeting is one of the two principal forms of targeting advertising. Basicly, behavioral targeting is the gathering of all kinds of information on the consumer’s web-browsing behavior. This technique should help firms increase the effectiveness of their advertising campaigns.

With the collected data, site owners can adjust the content of the ‘ads’ and thus display ads whose content is more relevant to the interest of the individual viewing the webpage. In other words: The right ad for the right person on the right time. A laborer that barely makes it through the month has no use for an advertisement of a luxury car in the middle of the financial crisis. 

I for one am not a big fan of this massive flood of advertising on the internet. I don’t enjoy the commercial banners nor the pop-ups. It’s just really annoying when you’re browsing and you’re constantly distracted because a useless pop-up just went fullscreen on your desktop.


Maxime Ossieur

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_targeting

iAd

We’ve seen the definition and the basics of targeting strategy. It’s time for an example. Apple is widely used by millions of people. The apple audience has invented billions of applications, so it can be interesting to advertise while people use these applications. This type of advertisment has earned the name iAd. Advertisement is one of the most important parts in a firm. They are constantly busy with innovation and figuring out ways to present their product to the world. IPhone and iPod touch users are one click away from business advertisement. Firms pay Apple to introduce their product in an application. The target group will variate from young people to important business men. This is a new and brilliant way to make advertisement. You just have to tap on the ad that will appear in the application. The application will pause. Another tap brings you back to the app. Ads in apps always take your attention away. This is the main goal of advertisement.  

http://advertising.apple.com/


Gilles Stevens

Basics of targeting advertising

In order to understand the concept of targeting advertising we first have to take a look at the basic tools for this marketing concept. Purchase history , demographics , and observed behavior. These are some of the most frequently used datatools in marketing. As told in my first blog good information is crucial. Companies use this information in these 3 categories in order to be able to target their audience.

First of all demographics , these are statistics about the human population and give information about age , sex , income , employment status , … . These data are a solid base of information to define a target market.

Secondly the purchase history of costumers. What can be more helpful when you want to know what people will buy than the knowledge of what they already have bought? As a third source of information processing there is what is called observed behavior. What people do is often different of what they say they will do or have done. This is the greatest problem with surveys , so instead of asking people what they will do their actions are observed. The combination of these 3 is a powerful targeting tool.

Wout steenacker

Data generation

Target advertising is only possible when companies have sufficient and correct information about customers. Thanks to the numerous new technologies and social networks,  firms now have huge databanks with statistics about consumers and their preferences. Famous social networks as facebook and twitter collect data about their profiles and sell these. This huge business of data farming also uses surveys to collect information. First of all this gives them the possibility to ‘target’ their target group. And secondly it gives the possibility to eliminate wasted advertising. If they know their target audience they also know who isn’t interested in their products or services so advertising for these people is useless.  Which leads to higher profits!  What remains are some important questions : where does this data war leads to? How far are firms willing to go for perfect data ?  And not to be forgotten where do we have a say in this? What about our privacy?

Wout steenacker

The 4 P's

In my previous blog I already highlighted that it’s necessary in our modern economy that firms specialize themselves in specific products for a specific target of customers to survive in the hard world of competition.
Besides that, there are two other import reasons for these market segmentation that will end up in creating more benefits; a firm can adapt more easily his resources to a target consumer, so unnecessary costs are avoided and as a result a better allocation of finite resources is accomplished. Furthermore, the Western consumer of today has an extensively variety in tastes, therefore is it more than interesting to respond with a variety of products to these clients.
As you can read in many related business books, the 4 P’s are very popular in the marketing-science: Price, Product, Place and Promotion. Here we will go deeper into the word Promotion and in the many ways it can exist.

In my opinion advertising is all about persuading a client in buying your product, so research in the interest of potential target buyers is a must for the marketing section of a company.

Jolien Tortelboom

In General

Target advertising is a widely used term in business strategies. It is a definition that’s linked up with marketing. Nowadays marketing is very important in the world of selling. It describes the strategy that a company follows to create customer interest in goods or services of a specific firm.

Because there are a lot of companies who create similar goods and services for people with the same needs and wants, it’s necessary to segregate these markets and to produce for a specific target of consumers. Therefore it is more than important to adapt also the advertisements to a certain audience your product will be useful to. Target advertising will help a company to distinguish his business from other related businesses and to create a multiplicity of new markets, who reply to the diversity in the tastes of the consumers of the 21st century.

It seems to me that targeting advertising is a very important and necessary marketing tool. I'm even convinced that if companies don't take a target consumer in acount they will fail in their business.

Jolien Tortelboom