Brunner Digital Blog

Much has been written about for the past 12 months about behavioral targeting and many that I have spoken with over the past few months talk about it like it’s a silver bullet that will solve all of the world’s online marketing challenges.

If you aren’t familiar with behavioral targeting then picture this –

Imagine that you are shopping for golf clubs in a sporting goods store. And then two days later you are browsing the showroom floor of an automobile dealer. As you walk the floor, out jumps the display of golf clubs that you were checking out the at the sportings goods store. Relevant communication, based on past behavior, at an unexpected place.

Sounds perfect right? And it CAN be very effective — but here are some things to keep in mind:

• Don’t forget the other targeting options that will compliment your behavioral targeting efforts — geo, profile based and contextual — all will make your behavioral efforts that much stronger.
• There are still limited options — behavioral is great for certain buckets — financial, real estate, sports, shopping, healthcare. But not focused enough for some product categories.
• There is still risk of your ad running in areas that aren’t relevant — you will need to let go of your brand a bit and understand that there will be a few misteps.
• There are typically minimum spend levels to participate in most networks, and to effectively test your campaign. Be prepared for a 90 day test, at a minimum.

So my bottom line POV — behavioral targeting can be a very effective part of your overall mix and should be explored — but let’s keep some of the pitfalls and key learnings in mind as we begin the journey.