Four Click Freedom

An innovation that is not even innovative.  Have we been stuck in the mud that long to actually be impressed by something like this?

Yahoo is saying they can better target ads to the content based search on their site.  Well isn’t that exactly how they come up with the actual content that they put on their site.  Now they are saying the ads are going to be more closely related to the content that is on the site.  So what! Put makeup ads next to the makeup content, put fashion ads next to the fashion content, put the sports equipment next to the sports content.  Big deal.

The Google expandable ads are a joke too.  You still have to click on them.  So you really don’t know if you are getting an expandable ad or sent to the site.  So what is the difference, it’s just a levy.  So you really want to pay for more that?

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The debate is on whether unique users are coming to your site.  Right now cookies are the only way to see how many visitors you are getting and this could be overrated by almost three times because of the deletion of cookies.  And you know this means advertisers will pay more but are now becoming cautious because they want their money’s worth.

So if a site is using their own measuring tools like Google AdSense or their host providers numbers, and these all vary based on the tools used to measure, then where are you going to get numbers that are actually relevant to your product and people’s response.

Clickboards.net acts a second party seller.  Although you do not buy anything on the site, you can acquire information and promotions used to buy the products as well as package deals and rebates for products.  Then when you decide to buy, either directed to the advertisers site, or by going to the brick and mortar store, that is when the first interaction between buyer and seller takes place.  So really the advertiser takes themselves completely out of the picture except for the sale, which is really the way it is supposed to be.

When you see all the worry warts and their efforts to make the internet privacy part of the experience and warn everyone about how they are being targeted, you can really see where I might start to worry.  I too would like to help facilitate marketers in targeting an audience on the Internet.

I believe what I am doing is much different than what is on the market, especially what is hyped up to be the next big thing like Feeva.  Targeting based on bla is still bla, I don’t care how big of a computer you have.  If people aren’t going to actually give you information and you are only going to take the scraps that they leave you or the bits and pieces that the Internet commissioner says you can legally use without having Internet users getting their hair standing on in, then how can you say you are the best behavioral targeting genius that is on this side of the hill?  Well you can’t, and that is what I have been discovering.  This not so new term called behavioral targeting is really a bunch of hoopla and it’s making a lot of people worried just because of the terminology.

I do agree with the part that you have to let people know what you are doing and saying how the information is used.  But if you actually create a platform where people get to tell you how they want the information used, haven’t you saved the people from going into tale-spins worrying about who sees what and what they know?

By giving the user options and control over their information is the real key.  Instead of people running in circles wondering how you are you going to use the information from late last night when they were searching for a honey on the Internet to target them, you should actually give them a choice about how they want to be profiled.  Ask them a question!  Say hey I saw you man, what are you up to, I know this isn’t your market and it doesn’t have anything to do with who you are, but even though you are here, what kind of information can you provide, your age, how many friends you have on Facebook, you like to party, you really keep to yourself and are pretty simple, what would be the one thing you would tell me if I knew you looked here?  I’m going to use it to get rid of all the crappola that surrounds your surfing habits now and give you something that might make a little more sense to your life.

Maybe this is th only way to get information out of people.  But the main purpose is say I will not give you more crap based on your habits, I will give you something you want me to, but to do so you have to reveal who you are in one little bit.   Much like twitter, would you be afraid to twitter as to what you are doing late this one night?  Maybe you won’t tell me exactly but that little tweet would be enough to change your experience and what is then given to you in return.  Something much more in line with who you are.

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