Location-based marketing is spreading beyond smartphones

Marketers are increasingly leveraging location data in four emerging channels: connected speakers, digital out-of-home, advanced TV and automotive, according to a survey from Factual, a location-data firm. According to the survey of 536 marketers:

• Forty-nine percent of marketers currently use location data for advanced TV (CTV, OTT, addressable TV) with the percentage rising to 50 percent in the next 12 months;
• Forty-seven percent currently use location data for digital out-of-home and half plan to use it in the next year;
• Forty-five percent currently use it for voice-connected speakers, and that number may rise as 53 percent say they are planning to use it;
• Twenty-eight percent use it in automotive and 36 plan to do so in the next 12 months.

Mobile is the main channel currently seeing use of location data (81 percent) and many emerging channels also utilize mobile devices. In a report last year on the expansion of digital out-of-home advertising, James McDonald, data editor, WARC, observed: “The combined power of digital out of home and mobile location data can be used to add greater targeting capabilities to a broadcast medium, serving programmatically-traded creative by the hour to the right people, in the right place, at the right time.” 

Source: Factual 2019 Location Based Market Report

Voice assistants offer the potential to not only locate nearby stores selling an item but stock levels and whether related promotions are available on the item. The Factual survey found 89 percent of marketers seeing increased sales from their use of location data. Primary uses include targeting, audience engagement, campaign strategy, audience insights and segmentation. Local-based marketing has faced privacy scrutiny, with critics calling out marketers for not using data anonymously. A poll from The Manifest last October, however, found 57 percent of U.S. smartphone users comfortable with apps tracking their location, largely for “convenience.” In June, Google made it easier for users to automatically delete their location data while noting that many consumers recognize that tracking location as well as web and app history maximizes the Google experience, including offering personalized recommendations for restaurants or helping browsers pick up where they left off on a previous search. 

• Factual’s 2019 Location-Based Marketing Report – Factual
• Digital to account for entirety of OOH growth – WARC
• Google Home Serves Corona Beer Promotion Based on Location Data and Local Inventory Feed – Voicebot AI
• Retailers Are Interested in, but Wary of, Location-Based Marketing – eMarketer
• Introducing auto-delete controls for your Location History and activity data – Google
• Do People Trust Apps That Track Their Location? – The Manifest