Have you ever browsed Facebook and seen an advertisement for a pizza place close to you and wondered how of all the pizza restaurants in the world, the one showing up in your feed is the one you are closest to? Have you ever browsed Netflix and seen a recommended show just like the one you’ve already watched? Advertisements and recommendations that relate directly to a consumer’s interests, demographics, and previous habits are all possible thanks to big data solutions and analytics.
How is Big Data Employed
Big data can be defined as vast quantities of information obtained from sources such as digital devices, or database networks, that are so large they require specialized software and resources needed to process and evaluate it.
Big data analytics solutions are used by businesses to establish a framework of algorithms in their own systems that allow them to gather information, store large amounts, and improve the efficiency of data used by an overwhelming amount. Businesses will analyze and interpret what their gathered data tells them to suggest targeted advertisements, suggestions, and recommendations to individual consumers. Big data is utilized to give companies a means to evaluate what kinds of important decisions need to be made. Through the information gained from studying similar data sources, they will reach users in more customized ways, guiding them to the products they get the most out of.
This data takes various factors into account when analyzed, including an individual’s habits, location, demographics, and more. For example, if a user lives in New York City, they wouldn’t have any use for a car repair shop in Switzerland. It also factors in consumer habits, like a person who browsed for multiple different dentists would get their targeted advertisement as a dentist in their area that they might not have looked at yet.
These databases are so vast that they contain countless terms and phrases, and when a consumer uses those terms in searches or posts, they know what kinds of ads will best align with them.
Benefits of Specifically Targeting Advertisements
For the consumers who actually receive these ads, they will have significant gains on their end, due to the data they have generated, marketers will present themselves directly to them, based on what is already known about the user. If a family is watching Netflix, and they have viewed 10 children’s tv shows in a row, it’s a safe assumption that they have children and enjoy child-friendly content. The shows and movies that would be recommended to this family would be far different compared to the ones recommended to a horror movie fanatic because each individual’s viewing habits are taken into consideration when selecting which content would most likely be viewed.
These advertisements are all presented to consumers as the ones that they will most likely purchase, watch, or remember later. Big data is constantly improving and working towards advertisements that are not only more accurate but also finding new ways to be presented to consumers in the first place. As more data gets gathered and analyzed, the potential of possible uses will only grow.
