Everyone’s talking about people-based marketing these days. On the surface, it does seem like quite a simple and rather obvious concept to grasp – it’s all about people, and how we can harness data to deliberately reach the right audiences.
However, this simple concept may not be so simple in practice. The unfortunate reality is that while marketing is about ‘people’, most marketers do not actually reach ‘people’. Do not be mistaken, it is not for lack of trying – it’s just incredibly difficult to do so.
When it comes to audience targeting, marketers have traditionally been limited to devices as opposed to reaching an actual person. This means that instead of producing tailored messages that ends up resonating with the right individuals, brands have essentially been blasting messages to as many people as possible and hoping they land.
With over 50 per cent of consumers feeling more loyal to brands that show a deep understanding of their priorities and preferences, sending messages that aren’t relevant impedes marketers’ abilities to develop strong relationship with their customers.
Why can’t marketers accurately identify their customers
People-based marketing is the ability to plan, activate and measure marketing communications at an individual user level, by determining consumer identity across digital and offline channels. It is transitioning marketing execution from what has historically been a siloed channel strategy to a new omni-channel customer-centric strategy.
But this is easier said than done, especially given the explosion of data today and the fact that identifiers for an individual are constantly changing and can quickly become outdated.
Moreover, rising concerns around personal data privacy amongst consumers have also served as a significant roadblock for marketers, making it increasingly difficult to not only collect but use consumer information – especially in a post-Cambridge Analytica world.
Yet, to reliably link an individual’s online and offline footprint to their user profile, marketers need unique and persistent identifiers such as an email, login, phone number or postcode.
As a result, the last mile of digital marketing was, for a long time, guesswork. Brands knew their content was reaching a particular IP address, device or cookie, they just didn’t know the real person behind it. While this finally changed when a handful of internet giants such as Google opened their vast, people-based networks, data was still very much in siloes across different touchpoints.
Finally, the solution is here – Identity resolution
The ability to tie all these data from multiple touchpoints together and resolve them to one anonymous persistent identity is known as ‘identity resolution’.
The process involves connecting hundreds of identifiers (people, data, devices – across any channel). Marketers can then tie them all back to the same person in a deterministic and secure way to enable people-based marketing, measurement and personalisation.
Identity resolution gives marketers control in conversations. They can develop and communicate the right messages effectively to the right people – not just certain groups of people in certain networks, but real individuals who operate within an entire world with infinite opportunities and choices.
The solution is available – and without it, marketers will continue to communicate in the dark. Begin your journey now with people-based marketing.