Happy new year everyone. It’s hard to believe that 2011 is already here, weren’t we all supposed to be driving floating cars like George Jetson by now?
While the financial crisis may have set the flying car back a few years, the information age we live in has come through with some pretty incredible technology. And it appears we are just scratching the surface.
Take Canadian cable company Cogeco. In partnership with CHCH Television, they are testing targeted and personalized television commercials. Using software by Invidi Technologies out of New York, advertisers are now able to send tailored messages to specific viewers. The system breaks down audience demographics based on TV watching behavior, making any time prime time for advertisers.
On the social media side, a relatively new player is making noise in a similar fashion. Toronto based Sysomos is making a big splash with their products, Map and Heartbeat.
Heartbeat is an incredible tool that allows marketers a level of detail never before possible. This one tool allows a business to monitor virtually all the conversations taking place in cyberspace covering the company, its products or its people. The data is then broken down into positive and negative buzz, and can be broken down by source location as well. What’s more Heartbeat even measures how much influence each individual posting about your company has in the blogosphere.
Map also allows you to drill down into the social media space and learn who is saying what, and most importantly why they are saying it. It’s a level of targeting so specific that marketers can now literally target individual people. This virtually makes each individual his or her own market segment.
Nearly 100 years ago, in 1922, retailer John Wanamaker said “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted – the trouble is I don’t know which half". It has taken some time, but it appears that thanks to these latest innovations of the information age. Well Mr. Wanamaker, marketers of the world... your problem is now solved. The recovery is under way... now get out there and sell! Good luck in 2011.
