The ability to personalise advertisements according to the preferences of individual users represents a fundamental paradigm shift in the advertising world.

Traditional advertising is based either on the current content that is being consumed or on demographics. Delivering more effective personalised advertisements requires an understanding of individual users and their motivations, that goes far beyond the broad demographics traditionally relied on to inform advertising campaigns.

To explore this concept of personalised advertising, we [the Amdocs Innovation Centre] carried out behavioural analysis studies in co-operation with some of our multinational mobile operator customers. Mobile operators allowed us access to fully anonymised user data covering the activity of over 5,000,000 subscribers over several months. From this data we created a behavioral profile for each user by leveraging a wide variety of available data sources such as mobile internet browsing history, mobile advertisement selections, previous purchases and anonymous demographics.

Targeting the right people isn’t as obvious as it may seem

Analysing the user interactions with different advertisements enabled us to automatically identify the most relevant advertisements likely to appeal to each user. Behavioral profiles allow us to identify the specific characteristics that drive users to select a certain advertisement.

It is important to realise that people are complex beings with a variety of motivations; relying on a user’s top interest to guide targeting can often be misleading. For example, and contrary to expectation, the most relevant factor for people clicking on an advertisement for a popular children’s toy was that the people were interested in fashion, current affairs, lifestyle and technology. It emerged that rather than the children themselves, that these were the mothers of children interested in these toy advertisements. Targeting advertisements at these women based on their top interests would have meant that they would never have received the advertisements for the toys.

To show the effectiveness of this approach we compared our personalised targeting to targeting based on demographic information such as age, home location and gender. We found that our techniques were five times more effective than the demographic targeting. Interestingly, combining demographic data with subscriber behavioral intelligence further boosted results showing that these two information sources are complimentary.

People are not stereotypes

One of the key discoveries of our research is that people are not stereotypes. Take for example user 1259bf8963 who, through their advertisement interaction, showed a keen interest in football and a noted disinterest in fashion. Going against the stereotype, user 1259bf8963 was actually female. If an operator had relied on demographics alone, user 1259bf8963, who we fondly named Patricia, would never have been targeted with football advertisements. Patricia’s case also highlighted the fact that often demographic information can be unreliable or contradictory. From her demographic information Patricia had a university degree, earned an exceptionally high salary, was married, had children and all by the ripe old age of 20. Perhaps Patricia is some kind of superwoman but we think this is unlikely.

Companies invest vast amounts of time attempting to identify their target audience. We believe, and our analysis shows, that the more you know about your consumers the more personalised the experience you can offer them. Our findings show that when trying to identify a target audience don’t rely solely on demographics, don’t stereotype and don’t underestimate the depth of user data that can be leveraged.

Bio

Dr. Evelyn Balfe is the Business Innovation Analyst in the Amdocs Innovation Centre in Dublin. Amdocs is a global leader in providing innovative software and service solutions designed to help companies build stronger, more profitable customer relationships.

For advertisers who have wondered what percentage of their target consumers are researching online before purchasing offline or who want to compare the role of online in the consumer journey from research to purchase, help is now at hand.
The IAB Europe in partnership with Google has launched the new Consumer Commerce Barometer (CCB). The CCB is a free online research tool which uses TNS data to provide agencies and advertisers with consumer insights across 27 countries and 36 product categories.
Using the tool, marketers can select a country or multiple countries and then choose different verticals to understand how likely consumers are to research and purchase online. The data in the tool will be updated every year to help marketers identify and quantify shifting consumer behaviour over time.
Catherine Borrel, research manager with the IAB Europe said: “We support this initiative because it will help everyone working in the digital advertising industry understand and compare the different ways consumers behave both by market, and by sector. This complements existing IAB Europe annual research on online advertising spend and consumer activities and attitudes by shedding light on the internet’s role in the purchase process across this diverse region.”
Henry Eccles, product marketing manager, Google Europe said: “In the past, understanding consumer behaviour entailed guesswork or the expensive collation of disparate third party data sets. Today, the Consumer Commerce Barometer provides agencies and advertisers with a free one-stop-shop where they can quickly and easily analyse consumer behaviour across different products and countries and target their resources more effectively.”

With kick off of the football World Cup less than a month away, the latest research from the Global Web Index (www.globalwebindex.net), shows the huge potential for making money from online sports rights.
The survey of 16,000 internet users includes people in many of the nations that will be taking part including the USA, England, Mexico and South Korea. This year’s World Cup will be the first where mass market online video streaming is a reality across the globe. Typically online rights are bundled with the TV deal as an ‘add on’, but the Global Web Index shows that these rights are seriously undervalued, with FIFA potentially missing out on millions in revenue.
The research shows there is already massive take-up of sports highlights and full length programming online. The Chinese lead the way where video platforms such as Youku and Tudou carry full length programming as standard. 35% have watched full length programmes online in the last month and 27% have watched sports highlights. Other countries are not far behind.
Crucially there is huge, untapped potential for cashing in on streamed sport content. Sports fans in India, South Korea, China, Mexico and Italy are most likely to choose to pay for their fix. Indians are most likely to pay to enjoy streamed sports without advertising (37%) followed by South Koreans (32%). In direct comparison, those living in the US and European markets in the study prefer free access, with ads. However there is still a very large interest in paying, and one that if monetised could be far more lucrative than the advertising revenue. It is a similar picture for watching clips of sporting highlights.

The Dublin-based social media agency Simply Zesty has agreed to an investment of €500,000 for a minority stake in the company, from The Oxford Research Agency (TORA). The deal now means the agency is valued at €1 million whose clients include Vodafone, Universal Pictures, Nokia and The Body Shop. The deal will enable both parties to develop new social media and research tools.
“This is a huge vote of confidence for our young company and we are delighted to be partnering up with such a well established and reputable company. We are hoping to add a new level of measurement to our social media offerings while also helping TORA to add a new level of social media to their research capabilities. This is a match made in heaven that will hopefully help both companies to grow significantly in the years to come,” says Niall Harbison.
“Given that we have just reached the one year mark, we are excited about this investment and hope it tells a positive story to other business owners out there, as well as those that work in social media. We see a natural fit between social media marketing and research, and think that both areas can take key learnings from each other that will progress the two disciplines,” says Lauren Fisher.

Good news from Belfield – NovaUCD client companies have created 30 new jobs since the start of the year and four new start-ups, Cernam, LogScreen, SmartBuilder Software and Tethras, have also joined the community.
Tethras (www.tethras.com), established earlier this year by Brian Farrell and Brendan Clavin, is developing web-based localisation tools for smartphone application developers, and employs seven people. Other NovaUCD companies which have taken on new staff include Aonta Technologies, BiancaMed and Enzolve Technologies.
A total of 28 high-tech and knowledge-intensive companies, occupying 39 incubation units, are now based at NovaUCD. These companies currently employ 170 individuals. An additional eight entrepreneurs are based in NovaUCD’s desk space facility.
Cernam is a specialist digital investigations company focusing on forensically-sound online evidence capture and analysis.

The reasons for this include an absence of detailed planning and a lack of knowledge about the full range of technology solutions available.

“Companies often commission online projects without a strategic context,” says Aileen O’Toole, MD of Amas.

Other trends in the report suggest digital advertising in Ireland will overtake radio in 2010 to become the third largest category. Online shopping is increasing significantly in Ireland e.g. 43% of 25-34 year olds purchase goods online regularly.

The full report is here http://bit.ly/9jJlzO.

The search for the new chief executive of the Irish IAB is over. Suzanne McElligot, a lecturer in marketing at the DIT, has been appointed to the position.

The IAB will represent the interests of Ireland’s growing digital media and marketing sectors. The first key piece of research to be published by the IAB will be a PWC report outlining the exact size and value of the Irish digital marketing sector.

Ireland’s digital marketers and publishers have waited a long time for the foundation of an Irish IAB. Founding members include Google and The Irish Times. One of McElligot’s key initial tasks will be to persuade more Irish online publishers to join the IAB for the long term benefit of Ireland’s digital media sector. The IAB will also strive to educate marketers on the growing importance of online marketing.