Whether you like it or not, in almost everything you do online, you’re giving away data about yourself, and your habits, to certain companies. For many years, businesses have been using this data back against you, to sell you products, suggest things to you and tailored their services to suit you. Even reading this very blog is giving data over to certain companies – Google, for example, could use your browsing habits (Viewing this blog) and suggest you read other articles based on Personalised Data.

It is good to be aware of what data you’re giving away, online, but that’s a topic for another day. For now, we want to share how we think personalised data will affect you in 2015 and beyond, both in what you do on or offline, and in how you are marketed to.

 

Traditional Passwords are dying

Having to type in a 12 character password with 1 capital letter and a number can be a little tedious, especially if you’re doing it repeatedly in a day. Personalised data is helping to change the way passwords are used to grant us access to the things we use, day in, day out.

 Passwords are slowly shifting from the single typed line that we’re used to, over to more physical or automated ways of unlocking or logging in. Websites, browsers, computers and phones all know who we are, now. In the same way that you only really have to sign into Facebook once, in an app on your phone, it is the same with your computer. The security checks happen when first logging in.

 

Personalised content

Content on the internet is often divided into generic content, and highly personalised content, usually behind a password wall. Sites like this blog, and Facebook are prime examples of this. With the wave of personalised content, these lines will become more and more blurred as we pace through 2015, and onward.

 Sites offering generic content and tips are starting to get smarter about who you are, you previous search history and what you’ve looked at on their site before. It is already happening, and will become more commonplace, where a website will take into account your previous search history, buyer habits and web activity to determine what it shows you, and tries to sell you.

 

The products you want will come to you

Following on from the ‘personalised content’, this will have one of the biggest effects on the e-commerce area. Shopping sites are starting to use data about you to market you certain products and services. They know what you want to buy, and possibly where you’ve already looked, where you are, age, gender and more.

 This could allow businesses to create pages and suggest products that are exactly what you’re looking forward, with the content, images and descriptions tailored around what you’re looking for, and touching upon the points you care about.

 

The omni-channel overhaul

Omni-channel is an approach to marketing that tackles more than one channel (Online, mobile, offline, in-store etc), but whilst it refers to different touch-points, the idea of omni-channel will only get bigger, until it becomes commonplace to many business to target us in as many ways as possible. laptop, phone, tablet, watch, in-store, driving and more could all be touchpoints in which we can be tracked or marketed to.

 

Online and Offline will merge

Online marketing has for a long time been relatively exclusive to the online marketplace, which makes sense – to market online and draw people to online e-commerce sites is a logical follow-on. However, with the rise of personalised Data, online and offline marketing are slowly beginning to merge. Many companies now know where you’re based, whether it’s an exact address or a rough area – this makes it far easier for them to market to you based on your location, encouraging you to come in store.

 


There is a thin line to be traveled between companies getting creepy with your data, and companies making your life easier through greater access to our data and buying habits. Slowly, we’re going to see this line pushed, stretched, moved and adjusted accordingly what is deemed acceptable.

 

 

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