CANNES, France—First-party data might not be a sexy topic for a beach discussion, but it is one that can help brands explore new opportunities for growth.
Scaled data sets from customer loyalty programs can help brands find out more about their consumers’ behaviors, getting under their skin and targeting them better than ever. ADWEEK editor in chief Ryan Joe sat down with three experts in the space: Brad Feinberg, vp of media and digital, AmCom at Molson Coors, Mike Petrella, managing director, strategic partnerships, Kinective Media by United Airlines, and Kara Puccinelli, chief customer officer at Nexxen to discuss how those companies are cultivating first-party data to help engage customers in new ways.
Starting a network
United recently launched Kinective Media, a network that uses insights from travel behaviors to connect customers to personalized, real-time advertising, content, experiences and offers from leading brands. Petrella talked about how United utilizes its mass of first-party data to engage consumers not just as seats on a plane, but on a deeper level.
United looked to create an immersive journey for its 108 million customers, but it had to identify when the right time to send the right message to the right customers was going to be. There had to be an emotional connection for members of United MileagePlus and other loyalty programs, and that meant meeting them at the right points in their respective journeys through more personalized and real-time offers and experiences that drive even greater loyalty.
“We took this idea and said, there’s an opportunity, there’s an emotion within this piece, there’s value to be had for the customer, there’s value to be had for our partners, there’s value to be had for United,” said Petrella.
The new venture allows United to enhance the travel experience for travelers with brands including Norwegian Cruise Line, Macy’s, Chase United Co-Brand Credit Cards, TelevisaUnivision, IHG Hotels & Resorts, as well as agency groups like Dentsu.
Best tactics in a post-cookie world
With cookies going away at some point in the future, knowing the incremental value that data sets are going to get a company in return is more important than ever, especially when trying to reach new consumers. Nexxen encourages brands to know what data sets can help them reach new prospective consumers and maintain trusting relationships with them.
Brands need to know about their consumers to be able to send messaging that will connect with them, and that involves knowing the scale of the data, the attributes associated with that data and if that data is highly verified.
“There is nothing more powerful than having data that we know is highly accurate that we can then use to reach in activation stages,” said Puccinelli.
The value of data
United has a lot of first party data that it can validate because of how people are identified through the screening and boarding process. Molson Coors doesn’t have that kind of access.
“We have to work really hard and get really creative to find and identify new ways to collect data, and it’s all about value exchange,” said Feinberg.
Molson Coors needs to make sure that it has the tools in place to assess the value of the data it gets, then look for new opportunities, like through a second-party partnership where it can grow the data.
Feinberg added that his company identifies the best data sources that can combine with its own first-party data to create unique audiences. Managing frequency of messaging and getting some form of personalization helps land the messaging.
“A lot of marketers miss out on creating personalized messaging that resonates, that takes advantage of the data they have,” Feinberg said. “So we’re making sure that what we put out in the world creatively also links to the data resources—combining both the creative and the media to drive the best performance.”
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