You walk into your favorite department store and are immediately recognized as a repeat customer. The store knows when you were there last and what you purchased. The store even knows what parts of the store you were in and can predict where you’re going to shop. Through technology, that big store may even know who your friends are. That’s big data.
Big data is analytical versus statistical. In the old days shop keeps could tell you their average customer’s age, gender and race. Modern businesspeople can not only tell you the same information, but can provide information about how and when you will use their services.
As soon as you walk into the department store there’s a camera that identifies you through facial recognition. Via unique signals broadcast from your phone the store can monitor where you visit and how you shop for your products. Finally, when you check out the store can match you with the items you purchased.
Before I get too far, this is reality and not a conspiracy theory. Facebook has a huge facial recognition database and many large retailers are currently using cell phone tracking as well as facial recognition in their stores. Ultimately, businesses are doing this to make money by providing a relevant match between the consumer and products.
About ten years ago I started to notice that our online personal information was being shared much more frequently. License agreements started including statements about personal information and how it was going to be used. Within the past five years Google took a ton of heat for sharing user information. My bank even withstood criticism for sharing personal information about its clients.
Technology has allowed companies to compile personally identifiable information about consumers. The department store I shop at knows me and that I will walk throughout the store twice (perhaps due to OCD issues) before I make my final purchases. It also knows what I purchase and how frequently. Let’s face it, I have a unique face and my cell phone broadcasts a unique electrical signal.
Big business uses big data because it makes them more money. Stores and online ventures can provide more poignant products and advertising. Google and Facebook can match advertisements by basic demographic information and information posted by the user. Retail stores can place products near each other that have relevance for specific shoppers.
I could spend years talking about big data because it’s something I’ve been studying since college. I love data and have always believed there’s more to predictive behavior than just a bunch of statistical facts. I know my average customer’s age and gender and I think every business owner probably knows the same of their customers. The real benefit for a business owner is applying more complex information to the basics.
I predict several years before separate businesses develop for the purpose of combining information about individual consumers from different sources. A unique business could potentially examine information specifically about me from sources like Walmart, Facebook, Google, Sprint and TDBank. Profiling me would be pretty easy with that combination so hopefully this never happens.
It’s amazing how much information is actually collected through our adoption of technology. Security cameras identify us and our smartphones allow us to be tracked. Someday we may be required to sign an agreement prior to entering a retail store relinquishing our rights to any privacy. Until the stores come clean, believe the conspiracists that big brother really is watching.
(Jeromy Patriquin is the President of Laptop & Computer Repair, Inc. located at 509 Main St. in Gardner. You can call him at (978) 919-8059 or visit www.LocalComputerWiz.com.)