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Audience Targeting Contextual Targeting Data Deep Dive

Should data marketers be shifting from targeting to suppression?

By Nick Graham, Senior consultant

Kepler

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The Drum Network article

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May 8, 2023 | 8 min read

Suppression is “the forgotten more sensible sibling of audience targeting,” writes Nick Graham of agency Kepler for The Drum’s data deep dive, The New Data & Privacy Playbook. Here, he heralds a paradigm shift back toward suppression.

Blurred grayscale image of person running through panels

Marketers must change their approach to targeting in spite of privacy regulations / David Werbrouck

In recent years, we have seen large shifts in the fundamental ways that marketers can target customers. In 2021, Google announced that it would be removing targeting categories like third-party cookies and device-level targeting, replacing these with new privacy-enhancing solutions, such as their Privacy Sandbox initiative.

Before that, in 2019, Meta began simplifying their targeting options, focusing on broader audiences in a more privacy-friendly way, less reliant on personal data.

Considering a return to a broadcast model allows advertisers to reach a larger audience, potentially increasing the scale of their campaigns, rather than relying on new ID solutions to replicate the post-cookie buying scale.

With increasing concerns over privacy and data protection and the way that data is collated and used, there needs to be a shift in focus from targeting to suppression.

Why suppress?

Suppression offers advertisers the opportunity to exclude certain audiences from ad campaigns, meaning data is no longer used to bring people into potential buying segments to target. Instead, it reduces audiences’ annoyance at being shown ads that they are not interested in or for products they’ve already bought.

Historically, there’s been a tendency for advertisers to go after heavy buyers. But this group is not necessarily going to drive incrementality. The suppression method offers a reverse way of targeting relevant audiences, focusing on light and medium buyers, and avoiding the need to target existing customers or those who have already purchased a product or service.

It also removes the need to target naysayers. Light and medium buyers will help to improve incrementality, especially as they may represent a larger portion of the market than heavy buyers.

Audience considerations

When audience building, the questions advertisers need to ask of their customers are: Are you capable? Are you motivated? And what is the trigger? The largest audience group should be those that are capable of buying the product or using the service.

It’s then a case of segmenting the audience and creating messaging that aligns with those segments. Suppression offers advertisers a way of excluding people without the capability or means to buy.

This form of addressable advertising still allows advertisers to show relevant messages to specific groups or individuals. The difference? It uses product features and benefits to engage with a larger audience, rather than trying to segment them into smaller groups. While this strategy isn’t new, it is perhaps the forgotten more sensible sibling of audience targeting.

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Putting suppression into action

Working with a large travel brand, we were able to use a sophisticated model of this kind to suggest which audience segments should be excluded from campaign targeting. This was based on aspects such as whether they’d interacted with the app (or received an email), or if they had a tendency to buy from the brand or had purchased a product within the last year.

Using a suppression model meant we could make sure that the ad dollars invested were being used to engage with the light and medium buyers, rather than the heavy buyers and the naysayers.

Meanwhile, new Customer Data Platforms (CDPs) have made it possible to link online and offline customer behaviors, providing a better view of interactions with a brand. This helps advertisers understand what factors are driving customer behavior, using insights to help make data-driven decisions.

The road ahead

While the data within a CDP is future-proofed, the main challenge with activating Personally Identifiable Information (PII) data is scalability, particularly for brands with low login rates or where customers prefer to stay anonymous. One solution is using alternative identifiers, such as an email address or mobile phone number, or supplementing customer data with third-party data.

Using a CDP to suppress recent buyers, such as those who have made a purchase in the last 30 days, or recent engagers (such as those who have engaged with your brand on social media in the last 14 days) can help advertisers reduce ad spend waste. This makes it an effective way to increase efficiency.

Testing suppression audiences can be a valuable tactic for understanding the impact of different audience segments on incremental conversions, and learning which customers have a high propensity to purchase a product or service. For advertisers wanting to be more customer-centric, using data to exclude individuals or groups from advertising, as opposed to using data signals to motivate them to buy, offers a better and less intrusive way to connect with audiences.

With fewer signals to target, priority should be given to re-evaluating the use of data to inform suppression strategies to ensure it is accurate and representative, recognizing any limitations or biases. It shouldn’t be seen as a means to now find subpar alternatives.

With people becoming increasingly uncomfortable with targeting, a suppression mindset can increase efficiency, limit harm and build trust.

To read more from The Drum’s latest Deep Dive, where we’ll be demystifying data & privacy for marketers in 2023, head over to our special hub.
Audience Targeting Contextual Targeting Data Deep Dive

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Kepler

Kepler is a global agency built for the digital world. We help advertisers harness the immense power of data, technology, and human understanding to transform their...

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