Real-time targeting cuts out guesswork

In response to your report on direct mail (MW August 17), I’d like to point out that you don’t have to target customers online to catch them while they are in the purchasing mood. There is another highly targeted marketing solution, using real-time data technology and based purely on a consumer’s purchasing habits, that is available in store.

Catalina technology delivers instant marketing communications to consumers, based on their purchasing history or simply the contents of their shopping basket, while they are still at the till.

This means that a mother buying nappies can be given a branded coupon for baby-related products with her change. The promotion is timely and relevant, tactile but unobtrusive, and requires no mass-mailings, demographics, guesswork or databases full of out-of-date information. It also guarantees that your message will cut through without competition from other marketing messages, unlike the busy online retail environment.

A direct marketing campaign targeting new mothers may take three months from prediction to the offer reaching them. By using instant coupons it takes less than three seconds. Considering that only 7% of retail sales are carried out on the internet, UK marketers need to realise that real-time targeting is not limited to the online environment but is within the reach of traditional, bricks-and-mortar retailers.

Sheridan Thompson

Client service director

Catalina Marketing UK

Oxford