From data to Big Data… in marketing
The production of digital data has grown exponentially over the past decade, ranging from 2 to 33 zettabytes between 2010 and 2018 (1 zettabyte equals 1 billion terabytes). This growth will be more explosive in the coming decades, rising to 2,142 zettabytes in 2035 according to forecasts by the German agency Statista.
The deluge of data
This deluge of data confirms the entry of our world into the era of Big Data. This new world requires new analytical tools to understand and make sense of it. A deluge of data that poses deep questions about their collection, interpretation and analysis.
Big data is characterized by the combination of the 3V rule: a gigantic volume of data to process, a wide variety of information (multi-source, organized and available) and a certain speed.
Big Data in Marketing
Big data is playing an increasingly important role in companies’ marketing and communication strategies. Businesses, in fact, make extensive use of consumers’ personal data in order to develop strategies adapted to each type of current and potential customer. This information is largely created through exchanges on social networks. Any marketing manager concerned with better understanding the practices of their customers and their opinions must regularly monitor what is happening on these networks.
Big data has come to facilitate this work for marketers by providing them with tons of information about their customers. They can thus analyze this information and track potential buyers when they browse the internet and display them banners to encourage them to buy on the pages they browse.
Some companies very early developed fairly sophisticated tools. This is the case for example of Amazon which, once a potential customer consults a product on its site without passing to the act of purchase, can offer him the same product in the form of banner advertising on other sites consulted later.
The Netflix video-on-demand (SVOD) service is another concrete example of the implementation of big data. Netflix processes a huge amount of data to develop algorithms that can offer its users suggestions for appropriate content based on what they are used to consuming.
Big data and the protection of personal data
However, the success of big data has highlighted the issue of privacy breaches. This subject is a crucial issue for companies that try their best to reassure their customers. They too are becoming more and more aware of the issues surrounding their personal data. As of 2013, a study by BCG on sharing personal information on the internet reveals that more than four-quarters of Europeans say they are careful when sharing information online.
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) of the European Union, which came into force on May 25, 2018, abounds in the sense of the protection of personal data of European consumers.
The Author
Mahamadou SIMPARA (Linkedin Profile) is from Mali and holds a Master 2 “Market Studies and Marketing Decisions” from the School of Management of the Sorbonne, in Paris (France). Mahamadou spent his entire young career at the CSA Institute of Studies where he held the position of Senior Research Executive.
