• by Paul Gough , January 22, 2004

When it comes to one-to-one marketing, the future is now.

That's the message that flowed through the Future of Information Summit, organized by Simmons Market Research Bureau and held Tuesday at a mid-Manhattan hotel. It was highlighted by a number of researchers and others trying to make sense of customer data integration and applying what they've learned to their companies' or clients' interaction with consumers.

But that's the rub. Technology, a raft of syndicated reports and an increasing sophistication of methodology has made it possible to learn a lot about your customers. Whether it passes the sniff test - giving the proverbial 360-degree view of customers - well, that's another story.

"Understanding your customers has never been easier. But at the same time, it's never been more difficult," said Bill Engel, chairman and chief executive officer of Simmons, neatly summing up the conference as it began Tuesday morning.

There's no question that companies want to learn more about their customers and their potential ones, providing a better bottom line. Customers are keen on protecting their privacy and controlling the level of messaging, but they don't seem to mind being marketed to when it makes sense. But there are hurdles to be met before marketers are going to successfully marry all the disparate sources of data, from a company's internal customer database to the third-party information that companies like Simmons specialize in, into a one-to-one marketing scheme that everyone can buy.

Not the least question is whether it's right to focus on one-to-one, one-to-some or segmenting audience in some other way.

AOL has faced its one-to-one marketing needs with mixed results. It would like to do a better job targeting its membership base, serving personalized advertisements and trying to upsell other products and services in interactions with subscribers. But it's hindered by its refusal to give up ground on protecting the privacy of its subscribers, a hallmark that AOL vice president/market research Howard Shimmel said isn't up for discussion. Since it doesn't monitor what its subscribers do, either on AOL or on the Web, it's missing an opportunity to really know its customers. AOL tries to make up for this by asking subscribers for information then marrying it with research both on and offline.

Shimmel said AOL doesn't need a study that looks at online behavior.

"That only gives a limited view of the world," he said. Media consumption, interests, buying habits and reactions to advertising are also important. But it's a lot easier said than done, as AOL has found out. While merging internal and external data sources can and are done, scoring the database and testing them for accuracy hasn't as yet created a strategy that can be carried out with the assurance needed to carry out among customers.

"I think we're on to something. The challenge is how we action off of it," Shimmel said of one-to-one marketing.

Nickelodeon has been able to combine behavioral data with Nielsen ratings to understand not only the audience that tunes into its cable channel but also its other media choices and, as important, the children who don't watch Nick. A case study presented by Ron Geraci, Nickelodeon's vice president of research and planning, showed how Nickelodeon used a combination of data to create a promotional campaign aimed at its non-core groups.

Nickelodeon uses Nielsen ratings, which define the demographics of the customer base and its size; syndicated research studies like Simmons Kid BehaviorGraphics Study and others that describe its customer base; and custom research like focus groups.

"The challenge is trying to link everything back to Nielsen, which is the basis of our return on investment," Geraci said. They were able to do it, which helped create targeted marketing strategies on and off channel.

In a portion of the conference, which was also sponsored by MediaPost Communications, publisher of MediaDailyNews and MEDIA Magazine, editor-in-chief Joe Mandese moderated a panel that included a media planner, a brand agency executive and a marketer from a cable TV channel. Mandese said that, from Madison Avenue's perspective, the old definitions aren't good enough anymore. Planners are interested in what consumers are thinking, how they're consuming media and how they're living their lives.

Jane Lacher, a consumer context planner at MediaVest Group in New York, said that when she started in youth marketing, there wasn't a lot of research and planners talked to real people all the time. Now, it's a different story.

"Now, where's the humanity," she asked. "We've got all this great information, hundreds of different data points, but maybe we forgot to speak to the consumer."