Behavioural Targeting,
the dream of the direct marketer 
By J de Groot.

Behavioural Targeting (BT) is an innovative way of getting in contact with potential buyers. The principal of BT is that the potential buyer is monitored in his search behavioural. It’s simple, monitor the Internet user who’s hungry for information. Find out what he is looking for, find out his weakness, and then when he’s least expect it… confront him with an effective pop-up. Imagine, you desperately need a new surf short. You use the Google search engine. You type in ‘surf short’ and the quest for a new surf short is on. After a dozen of site’s and collections you find your ‘one-out-a-million’ surf short. But the next time you open your Internet explorer a pop-up will shown about the new collection of O’Neill’s beach-ware. How come?  

This is a typical example of behavioural targeting. The Internet users are segmented in ‘interest groups’. In other words they know what you like… And they make profit out of that knowledge. And we the ‘poor sheep’s’ are buying it…  

Using BT technology
Study’s shown that behavioural targeting is a very effective way of communicating with potential customers. It’s saving money in research, and effort in reaching clients who are probably not even interested in the product. The most important reason companies a using the BT technology is that is a very cheap 24/7 advertising campaign.  

For each business a different costumers approach.
There are several types of BT. So whether you’re in banking or you sell shoe’s there’s always a BT solution for your business.

The first most common type is based on the amount of search hits of a particular type of website or web-page. For example if you are visiting the sites of O’Neill, quicksilver or Billa Bong you would be placed in the ‘surf orientated-segment’. This information is stored on your own computer in cookie-files. The next time you open a site as ebay.com the banners and pop-up will be about surf stuff.
The second type of BT is based on the ‘top five keywords’ of an article the user is reading. Every website or web-page contains keywords. Those word help the search engine find them. If you are publishing a site about beachwear, effective keywords would be ‘swimsuit’, ‘surf’ and ‘beachwear’. A search engine like Google will read these words and compare them with the searchers request. Based on the similarity of the keywords and requested information, the search engine is ranking the sites in order of relevance. When you visited the site the BT technology is reading the top five key words. Based on the words the visitor is placed in a segment. And the rest is the same.
The third and final type of BT is based on the visitors on your site. When you visited a site you are placed immediately in an interest segment. This can only work with sites which are build for the BT technology. 

Now you know….
You see there’s a lot cooing on in the advertising world of Internet. But don’t feel assaulted in your privacy, and make your own profit out of this. After all what’s better than the bargains are coming to you, instead of hours looking for it. 

Weblog Article Peer Review Form B – Second Review

Writer’s Name: J de Groot
Assessor’s name: M Glas
Date: 10-10-2007

Rating Scale: 1 = Yes 2 = Somewhat 3 = No
Rate the article by giving a 1, 2 or 3 for each question. Read the article once to get a general idea of what it is about, then read it a second time to rate it.
1. Is the topic interesting? 1
2. Is the title original and appropriate? 1
3. Is the introduction complete? 1
4. Is the body of your article complete? 1
5. Is the conclusion well-developed? 1
6. Is the article well-organized overall? 1
7. Is the article easy to understand? 1
8. Is the article interesting to read? 1
9. Has any plagiarised material been removed? 3 (because there was no plagiarised material to remove)

Do you feel that the writer has improved the article? Why or why not? Be specific.
Yes, it’s even more clearly than before. The spelling and the use of words are corrected.  
 

Has the writer changed the article adequately according to your suggestions for improvement of your first assessment? Describe the changes and state specifically whether you think they are an improvement.
Most of the suggestions I made are processed. He changed ‘how’s’ into ‘who’s’ and some of the words and sentences are modified. I think this version is much better than the first one.

Are you happy to have this article on your weblog? Why or why not? Be specific.
Yes, I’m happy with this blog. It’s a nice article. The information could be very usefull to our O’Neill project. Because we want to arrange a web shop.