How Blockchain may save (online) marketing
When you have followed blockchain and cryptocurrency as I have the past years. You understand that I am getting excited by the thought that, within a few months time, I will be living in “Cryptovalley”. No, this is not near Palo Alto, San Francisco. It is the nickname of a part of Switzerland called “Zug”.
When announcing to my friends that we would move within Switzerland, from Vaud to Zug. Almost everyone said; “Ah – because of the taxes?”. And yes, it is true that the region has one of the lowest capital/income taxes from Switzerland if not the world (Excluding Monaco and Gurnsey / Malta for a moment).
But we will move to the region for my wife’ job within Pharma and me being able to be closer to Zurich. As a marketeer, being closer to the spot where most brands headquarter and the general digital and creative scene is centralised, is important.
I am expecting a lot from this move. On the subject blockchain and crypto developments, getting closer to one of the larger development hubs is interesting. The two topics, Blockchain and Marketing actually have more in common than you think. I will try to explain the/a few of the ways the two could be seen hand in hand in the following years to come.
Consumer Privacy and the future of GDPR
With the right use of Blockchain, it is possible to better distribute, control and regulate consumer data. Over time it will be more transparent where you have left your data, to which degree that data was extended/modified/additional data sources were used to enrich. Yes, I am talking about the tip of the iceberg that was just uncovered with Cambridge analytica.
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This will later be seen as the tip of the iceberg. Because in my mind, this cannot be a single event. It must have been used by hundreds, if not thousands of smart companies and individuals. Who found out that they could ‘game’ the Facebook API. With the right effort and some bought virality (advertising), a minor app could “mine” millions of user profiles. You as a user was unwillingly sharing all of your friends’ personal data by simply playing a game on your mobile phone which you connected to your Facebook account and ‘clicked’ on yes when asked if you agreed to their terms.
Having a blockchain solution to manage, monitor, and when needed retract all of your profile data, is something that will most definitely be in place in the coming years. Where we have “1 password” apps now, controlling all your decentralized passwords from different platforms. You will now be able to control all your personal data from 1 dashboard. It will be GDPR on steroids. 1 action and you will stop any firm from using your precious personal profile. It is like having the half-baked GDPR law put into permanent high alert modus. Currently, it is very hard for lawmakers to check and control every company and person if they obey the GDPR laws. With blockchain, you could theoretically put the key into the consumer’s hand, where it belongs.
Brand values matter more with blockchain
Consumers have always been naive to what brands tell them about themselves and their products. Most of what we know about brands is constructed with smart and tactical marketeers. they know what to say, where and when to say it. To make you believe their story so you buy their product. With blockchain you can say that one of you values is to regenerate the rainforest. For every product sold, you are planting a new tree. have you EVER checked a company with that claim? Now it can be documented and reviewed for eternity. There is no hiding from the truth.
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Product marketing was never more easy, for good products..
This brings me to products. If you can show a person that every ingredient you have sourced truly is from that one region in Africa where they are paid a fair price. Now you can show it. Your brand claim becomes so much more valuable. Consumers are more and more interested in “pure” and fair products for the right price. Now you can show them, via an undeniable source, they can make the right purchase and buy into your brand and product.
Programmatic transparency and guarantees
This is not meant to be a technical piece, but I do need to dive into technology for a moment. The trend in digital marketing for the past years has been the word “Programmatic”. Meaning the technology to present the right brand message/consumer trigger to the right person at the right time. If you have looked at car websites, you are likely to see more than one car brand advertising in your upcoming web behavior. If you are near a fast food restaurant and have liked one or two fast food brands on Facebook in the past. You are very likely to get a “special offer” around lunchtime.
This programmatic world does not stop at traditional display advertising. It goes into TV, Radio, even outdoor displays. In this world, there are a lot of middlemen. They earn money by building network reach and “harvesting” clicks/conversions. The two, reach and clicks/conversions for a brand often combine the current KPI’s of success. the problem is that more middlemen are working together and/or against each other without a brand nor the consumer knowing about it. 1 banner view and click does not have to come from one user. It could be that the click is the result of 3-5 different networks fighting (in the background) for you click. With blockchain, it becomes clear for brands where their ad was served. What behavior the consumer had and what the cost was for this service. It cuts out most middlemen and should reduce costs. This transparency will make the currently very hard to do fraud checks, easier and more cost-effective.
Campaign reporting backbone
If transparency becomes the keyword. It is also possible to generate better reports through fixed procedures. Building reporting tools on the blockchain will be a commodity. Using the data from different sources may still be a challenge, but become easier over time. Correlating these data streams to contextual layers will be the new standard for brands.
Criminal influx will stagnate
Blockchain produces a history, that can not be erased, with every move that is done. This means that criminals, who are now often pointed at as having taken over blockchain and crypto, will not like this trace. They do not want to live in a world where every millimeter of their behavior can be retraced. Every possibly malicious behavior is transparent and can be used to alert bad activity even before it happens through pattern matching.
Opinion leader Advocacy beyond the hipsters and hype
People will always be interested in opinion leaders or as we call them in marketing “influencers”. With blockchain developments, the consumer will be able to see the difference between the clowns and the true advocates. not be fooled by the hype but follow the true best product/service/solution.
Reach platforms have nowhere to hide
Within marketing, there are a lot of traditional exposure platforms (big news agencies or popular networks like Facebook). These are used by brands to get their product seen by the potential clients. Unfortunately, there are quite a few differences in the reporting of these figures. Not all are truthful. Some even categorically exaggerate their visitor figures or artificially inflate their reach. With blockchain, there is no escaping the transparency.
ICO, tokens, crypto marketing regulations
For most people it is very hard to understand the best way to execute marketing In the world of ICO’s, tokenized products, blockchain services. Not only are more and more services declining to serve these types of companies who want to make use of these developments (Google and FB recently declared they would no longer accept ads concerning ICO’s or Cryptocurrencies. They fear the bulk of these parties being malicious. Example 1) My personal opinion is that we need to come up with a preventive “code of conduct / way of working” for these types of marketing efforts. There are a lot of companies who do use these technologies, want to raise money via an ICO or just plainly promote a cryptocurrency because the product behind it is of quality. Having a “code of conduct” will make things transparant and all concerning parties can review the “Advertisers” at any given moment. I know this is a pain. But the current situation is far worse than a bit of regulation or a new respected third party giving a quality stamp after doing you homework. .
Conclusion:
Brands/media managers will need to demand a adoption of blockchain from themselves and their partners. Consumers will need to be open to the truth about them being the product and take back their control. The whole blockchain movement is in its infancy stage. Not even crawling across the room. yet, it is already talking and impacting the room it lives in. The development will increase exponentially in 2018 and beyond.
If you are a brand. It is smart to start investing time and budget in this development now. If you are a consumer. Be wise about your data, whom to trust and what services to use. Seize the opportunity to use blockchain solutions and try to further understand its roots and future. It WILL impact your life no matter how much you may not want it to. In general. Don’t be afraid of progress. Embrace and learn, step by step. I am looking forward to the innovation and progression of my profession, based on blockchain and other innovations.
Do you have questions about this subject or would like me to help you with your focus on marketing and blockchain? Just drop me a line at >> mark AT brandpwrdmedia . com << or click here: https://brandpwrdmedia.com/
Research & images sources:
https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/14/17118846/google-ads-ban-cryptocurrency-ico
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/03/20/politics/steve-bannon-cambridge-analytica/index.html
https://mybroadband.co.za/news/business/227721-dont-be-evil-google.html