It’s spooky, it’s creepy, it’s digital marketing baby.

No matter how dire something may seem in your industry, remember to always look at the obstacle as the opportunity. You could also look at other industry’s obstacles as a new opportunity for you! With candy sales declining as Trick-or-Treating is canceled across the nation, Krispy Kreme launched a campaign about “reverse trick or treating” that is really sweet, pun intended.

If you’re looking for lessons on how to differentiate from competitors, even though you have no tangible or significant differentiation, look at the Selzer Wars currently raging between alcohol companies. They all sell the exact same thing — fizzy water with some vodka in it — and they’ve been getting really creative to differentiate. Coor Seltzer just launched a campaign that claims that when you drink their hard Seltzer, you will save the rivers. It makes no sense at first blush, which is why it works! Breaks your brain a little. You’ll have to click that link to find out what they mean, and make sure to watch the commercial, it’s hilarious.

This week’s Dispatch was written by Milly Sauber, Director of Media at SRH.

Do you ever feel like someone is watching you? Like there’s someone following you around everywhere you go? There is. It’s me.

And all of the other digital marketers that are out there in the world. We know that you’re married, we know that you have teenage kids, we know they go to private school. We know that you like to buy your home decor from Crate & Barrel, that your favorite show is Cupcake Wars, and that you have a 780 credit score. We also know that you’re more likely to purchase things in store rather than online.

Now obviously that isn’t you (unless it is), and while I may not get a name and address, I can find people who fit that description above. It’s all based on different types of audiences. I’m going to walk you through what the audiences are, and what categories fall into each.

1. In-Market Data
   In-Market audiences are composed of people who are ‘in the market’ for something. For example, you’re working from home and the chair at the kitchen table just isn’t cutting it anymore. So you decide to hop on Google and look for a new office set up. Because of that search history, I can find you on both Google and Facebook and serve you ads for swivel chairs.
2. Purchase Behavior
   Are you someone that likes to buy things online? Maybe you’re someone who has purchased something after seeing an ad? Maybe you prefer to shop online and then complete your purchase in store. All of these options are available as targeting options!
3. Affinity Audiences
   Do you like things? Most people do, and that’s how this audience is composed. Affinity audiences are used for interest based targeting, so someone may have an affinity for home and garden, or video games, or sports. This is a pretty basic audience, but it sure is effective!
4. Demographic Audiences
   This is all the fun stuff like gender, age and location. But depending on the platform, it can also include income and credit score information. Typically the income is set up in brackets, like Top 25%, Bottom 10% etc. and location can vary from state to city and even geographic coordinates like latitude and longitude.
5. Remarketing
   Everyone’s fav. Pretty simple, pretty standard, if someone visits your website or property, you can follow them around the internet. What most people don’t know, is that you can segment your audience based on how long ago it was they visited your site. At SRH we love setting up different creative at various stages of the remarketing journey, like 14 days or 30 days.

There are some providers that have access to even more granular targeting options, like health data or weather data for example. And do we use it? When we need to, sure, but we like to keep it pretty ethical here at SRH, and never run anything that could make someone feel vulnerable, targeted or offended.

It’s also important to remember that different platforms have different capabilities, what’s available on one platform may not be on another.

If you ever want to hear a story about how back in the day you could actually target a specific person on Facebook (it’s wild and it’s true), or you just want to know more about audience targeting, feel free to reach out. Always around for a good chat!

Toodles and remember, someone (could be me!) is always watching.