SXSW 2012 - Your Privacy Is Our Marketing Problem

Your Privacy Is Our Marketing Problem
Event	Interactive 2011
Format	Panel
Organizer	Brian Asner – Upshot
Description	Today’s consumers expect products and services to be customized to their personal tastes, targeted to their immediate locations, and relevant to their most pressing needs. These demands are being made of digital services, multi-channel (online/offline/mobile) retailers, and location-based services that straddle the virtual and physical worlds. But, to provide true personalization, these services must collect and apply consumers’ preferences and private data. There appears to be a contradiction between consumers’ enthusiasm for a technology-enabled future and their backlash toward the privacy compromises that are necessary for these enhancements. Most analysts interpret this contradiction in one of two ways: either consumers will be pushed too far and will rise up against these invasive services in order to defend their privacy, or privacy is just a media-hyped myth that consumers can comfortably disregard. I believe this to be a false dichotomy. Consumers do want personalized services, privacy does matter, and the balance will revolutionize the way we interact with the world. The problem is a third factor: failing to effectively “sell” the benefits of personalization. Based on research I have conducted with my colleagues, we propose that the tensions about privacy are a product of inadequate marketing by providers of personalized services. This panel will offer, and refine, a working framework for services that want to offer the benefits of personalization to their customers.
Questions Answered	Incorporating the panelists’ input, what is an applicable framework for digital services that want to communicate the benefits of personalization to their customers? What can we learn from the products and services who are effectively communicating the benefits of personalization? How does the marketing message change if we distinguish between privacy concerns and security concerns? Who should be responsible for educating consumers more broadly on privacy and personalization? The providers of personalized services? Industry trade associations? The government? Aside from marketing, are there other factors that are impacting the discussion about personalization and privacy?
Level	Beginner
Category	Branding / Marketing / Publicity
Tags	marketing, personalization, Privacy

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Your Privacy Is Our Marketing Problem