And a whole lot of other people too, and you may not know it.
In the past month, I have met with two different groups pitching a new trick for your marketing trunk. Ten years ago I might have been upset with something like this, but now I think it is kind of cool.
Over 5.5 million Canadians have enabled “Follow Me” on The Weather Network app on their mobile device. This allows you to get real time weather and alerts within a 1km radius of your location. What you don’t know is, they are also capturing the day-to-day activities of your phone. They know where you went shopping, how you travel to work each day, where you fill up with gas and so on and so on.
By tracking your phone’s ID number (not your name) they also know things like your gender, age, household income and personal interests. So how does this benefit your business? It gives you the ability to get information about who is driving by your business, the time of day, how many times a week, and the opportunity to target one or all of them with ads on The Weather Network app.
For instance, if you are having a lunch special at your restaurant, you can advertise to women 18 – 32 with an interest in yoga within a two block radius of your restaurant. You have the ability to be that finite.
This can be intimidating but it is reality and you may as well embrace it. With some creative thinking, you could build a very clever and effective advertising campaign. It might be worth a try.