Make It (at least a little bit) Personal

Some not-at-all-surprising results of studies by ChoiceStream, Harris Interactive, TNS Global, and TRUSTe:

1. People are more attentive to personalized advertising messages online
and
2. People are concerned about the privacy implications of being monitored online (which is what allows their messages to be personalized)

Nothing really new here. Almost any old-school direct marketer will tell you that mailings with the recipient's name and other personal info will usually get a better response than more generic pieces.

The two challenges are:
1. Getting past the contradiction. People like the results of personalization but not the process.

The solution to this one is education and familiarity. Over time, Internet users will get used to being tracked. The longer they can go without a negative experience, the better. The industry needs to actively educate these users, though. We need to clarify just how much information is monitored, how personally identifiable it is, and the potential ramifications. With a thorough understanding of things like Behavioural Targeting, I suspect that most users will not mind it.

2. Personalizing without scaring anyone. I'm still annoyed by the the number of completely un-targeted, non-personalized advertising online.
Okay, consumers are afraid of BT. Fine.
And many advertisers don't even understand it fully. That's a shame, but acceptable.

So, why not start things slow? You don't have to address your audience "personally", but at least start segmenting into some relevant groups.

How about the simplest, easiest, and one of the most basic things:
Do some geo-targeting, and change your messaging to reflect this -- dynamically serving ads that are relevant to that area... "Fly from Dallas to London for $320!", "Free shipping to Michigan", "Upcoming events in the Northwest"...

It's not difficult, and it has obvious advantages for both advertiser and audience. So why is so much advertising so untargeted (in both media buy and creative)?