A few articles coming out recently from Forbes and NYTimes have drastically overstated the intent and generally the capability of large retailers\u2019 ability to analyze customers and their shopping behavior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Having some experience in Retail and specifically with the company and people mentioned in the articles below I can say that database marketing tactics are not nearly so glamorous (or devious) as they have been represented in these articles. Statisticians don\u2019t sit around cooking up ways to invade someone’s privacy. They sit around thinking up ways they can get another percent of incremental productivity, usually response rate, out of an email or direct mail campaign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The data used in database marketing sometimes can be perceived to be invasive and certainly, these articles are written with a tone that is geared primarily toward shock value. More often than not the data available to retailers is inaccurate for a variety of complex circumstances and it is a part of the database marketers’ job to \u201ccontrol\u201d for those inaccuracies by executing marketing campaigns with proper experimental design techniques. Personally, in the decade or so of practicing database marketing, I\u2019ve never been able (or interested) in pinpointing an individual by name, address, or any other private information that your average consumer would consider invasive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Database marketers can not determine causality. We do not know the actual cause of customer behavior. We are only left with correlations, complex subjective and objective algorithms, and a pesky margin of error.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As much as I\u2019d like to tout being a part of sophisticated database marketing projects in the past the honest truth is, as a database marketer, we sift through a lot of complex data, statistics, and resources to come up with marketing programs and campaigns that many times don\u2019t work. And when a program or campaign finally does work it is not based on the identification of causality rather it is most often just correlations between various data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2013 Josh Smith \u2013<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A few articles coming out recently from Forbes and NYTimes have drastically overstated the intent and generally the capability of large retailers\u2019 ability to analyze customers and their shopping behavior. Having some experience in Retail and specifically with the company and people mentioned in the articles below I can say that database marketing tactics are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n