Page 145 - Reclaim YOUR DIGITAL GOLD (without audio)

Social PlatformS

things. The story of the high school student who began
receiving online coupons from the retailer Target for
baby products is likely familiar to at least some of this
book’s readers. Before her father found out his daughter

was expecting, he was enraged that Target had sent her
coupons for baby products. However, he was unaware
that she was pregnant at the time. Target discovered this
information before he did by analyzing his daughter’s
search data and social media content.

HOW CAN SOCIAL MEDIA DATA HELP
BUSINESSES?

According to new research from ProPublica, Facebook
“collected more than 52,000 unique attributes
that Facebook has used to classify users” in 2016
(ProPublica, 2016). That is a lot of information about a
single person. Most people couldn’t even name 1,000
different characteristics about themselves, let alone
52,000 distinct characteristics. When marketers are
presented with 52,000 distinct characteristics about
just one person, they are frequently overwhelmed by
the volume of data and are unsure what to make of it all
(unless they are assisted by AI).
First, we will look at the different types of social media
data points that are collected. Then we will consider
how marketers can use this information for targeted
communication with users and to build stronger
relationships with them.

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