Do you really know who loves your brand? Do you know what they want and what context they are in? The truth is, only I know what I really want. In fact, ‘you don’t know who I am,’ one would be inclined to say.
We are not trying to write here an ironic or philosophical piece. The point is to reflect on the quality of data around consumers.
Let’s take a step back. Anyone’s identity in the digital world is intermediated by technological solutions aimed at having full brand control of the data, while minimizing frauds in all exchanges. Any actor that wants to sell their products collects a range of data about people, trying to push sales and minimize risks for everyone. Brands identify consumers through an e-mail address, logged-in browsing (which happens 50% of the times), or via cookies for prospect clients. In a world that will part ways with cookies very soon, the only way to recognize VIPs is through a slow and continuous enrichment of customer data, around an e-mail in Europe, a cell phone number in the U.S., and a WeChat account in China. The trade-off is brand ownership of the data, which is matched by a series of benefits, the purpose of which is to increase consumer engagement and stimulate loyalty. One of the best loyalty programs in the world is by Starbucks, which owns the consumption data and socio-demo characteristics of 20 million coffee fanatics and goes so far as to calibrate its marketing around ‘personas,’ or segments, that will respond more readily to offers built specifically for them. The limitation of Web2 is right here: it would be too onerous to build a dynamic offer on a one-to-one basis, and we don’t even know what each one of our fans wants at any given moment, without asking them. It would also be risky from a legal point of view because we don’t have a tool for tracking, verifying, and responding digitally to thousands of transactions per second.
Until now. Blockchain adds a level of detail, impact, and efficiency to what we could do. Our idea is not to abandon the old CRM, but to put it side by side with an additional layer of ‘curation’ of those VIPs who want to collaborate with the brand to co-create unique experiences. First, fan identification is done through a wallet, which allows anyone, once they go through a KYC (know your customer) process, to be an active part of a community. Second, ownership of the data remains with the fan, who decides when and where to get involved, in exchange for rewards and benefits, which are bestowed on the right person, at the right time and in proportion to their desire to get involved, with a dynamic and instantaneous service, which only a smart contract on blockchain can guarantee. After September 2022, the new Ethereum (which embraces proof-of-stake) travels at about 100,000 transactions per second, at a cost per transaction infinitely lower than any financial transaction in the Web2 world, without error and hacking risks. The brand efficiently rewards that part of its base that is eager to increase the social capital of the community, while fans are in control of their social capital and can fully enjoy their status to receive benefits that tangibly add to their utility, because they are the ones who choose them. To return to Starbucks, a Starbucks VIP who buys into a flagship in New York, and then into a franchise store in Milan (run by Percassi) and then online in Dubai (perhaps with a hybrid structure) is not recognized and served as he or she deserves, precisely because of the difficulty of identifying the fan among databases that do not communicate with each other, and because of the inability of a system, based on personas, to respond instantaneously to a unique, individual customer history. Blockchain, being a distributed ledger, ensures the visibility of all certified actors, and returns a personalized service, thanks to its programmability. The future of marketing lies in absolute personalization and co-creation, all made possible by the blockchain.
