As Geofeedia preps the full roll out of its place-based ad offering, VP Product R.J. Talyor says brands are winning the war against the ‘creep factor’ — making location matter more than ever.By Lauryn Chamberlain
As location ad targeting has become more sophisticated, many consumers have still remained cautious at best when it comes to sharing their location.But the rise of Uber, Postmates, and other on-demand services has helped to turn the tide; as users have grown accustomed to sharing location signals to power the everyday aspects of their lives, so dawns an understanding of the personalized experience that can be created through being open about location in a variety of contexts.“More than ever, our consumers are interested in sharing their location data,” said R.J. Talyor, Geofeedia’s VP Product. “They know that it can be used to create a more personalized and better experience.”GeoMarketing: Why is location so crucial to how marketers connect with consumers? How do you view the state of the location ecosystem today?R.J. Talyor: Why location? The short answer is because of how much context and location can mean together.We always talk about the ‘right message at the right time to the right person at the right place’… but that ‘right place’ has never been more accessible than now. Before, the ‘right place’ was always the local store where you go.Now, consumers go to a marketers’ website. They go to the app. They go to the store. They go to competitor stores. Because of all that, the right place is really anywhere. This is where contextual location comes in: Marketers have to understand what each place is and what the context of the individual is right then. We’re to the point of being able to understand a place, not just target it. That’s how you deliver the message with the most impact.More than ever, our consumers are interested in sharing their location data because they know that it can be used to create a more personalized and better experience. In fact, [apps like Uber], etc. have really made a difference in getting customers used to sharing their location for [basic purposes], and then it can become something more. And it has.That, personally, I find completely fascinating. I think it’s a turning point for our industry.Going forward, we [in the ecosystem] all need to be transparent about privacy and how we use the data. How we don’t use the data. It’s one of those things that we’re learning along the way. That’s where I personally I think I find a lot of value, career-wise.How do you deliver that kind of transparency to fight the ‘creep factor?’First up, it’s all about permission and never violating that permission. I really found that that’s a guiding principal across my entire career. First permission, and then the second piece is expectation setting. Beyond just getting permission, marketers have to make sure to say, ‘Hey, here’s how I want to use this data.’ Again, not going beyond that.Then the third conversation is around value. Consumers need to receive something of value in exchange for sharing anything, whether it’s their first name or their email address or their location. They’re more willing to continue to do that, and then they tell their friends and speak in good ways about location sharing, and that’s how understanding really grows.We’re going to continue to grow this industry together, and that’s certainly the way that we think about things here at Geofeedia as well.How does the forthcoming Geofeedia Ads product, coming later this spring, fit into the space?Geofeedia ads will work to help marketers to optimize their social ads based on location data, and we’re seeing great results from testing it so far. It gets location data from geo-tagged posts [and uses it to better target] advertising on social networks.It’s about bringing together social media marketing with contextual location, which is important for all the reasons we just talked about.We also are working on a huge set of enterprise capabilities. We know that many people are interested in using location data, and they want to use it in different ways, and they’re all interested in different locations.What we’re really interested in within in the space is expanding the location signal that Geofeedia currently captures just from social. We to marry that up data up with other location signals coming from apps, or coming from IoT, or coming from any area.The goal is to really help complete the picture for organizations who want to take action on that location intelligence.Last question: We’ve talked a lot about how much “place” matters. So, what’s your favorite location?Interesting. My favorite place is the Embankment Tube Stop in London, UK.