I’m sure you haven’t missed Brexit (Leave.EU) or who won the US election. In both of these campaigns personality (phsychometric) based advertising were used on social media. Ads were targeted not only by demographics and interest, but also depending on personality. The same company lies behind these campaigns – Cambridge Analytica. In this article I will explain why we should use personality based targeting when we are advertising on social media.
What is the ”Big Five”?
The Big Five is the name of a psychometric measurement perspective in personality psychology.
Openness – (culture, originality, intellect, art, emotion, adventure, curiosity)
Conscentiousness – (will to Achieve, self-discipline, aim for achievement, planned behavior)
Extroversion – (energy, positive emotions, seek stimulation, likes to be around others)
Agreeableness – (compassionate and cooperative toward others)
Neuroticism – (experience unpleasant emotions easily, anger, anxiety, depression, vulnerability; sometimes called emotional instability)
These five personality perspectives was developed in 1980’s by two teams of psychologists and are also called OCEAN.
Back then they didn’t have access to data as we have today and therefore they couldn’t use it the way we can in todays marketing.
Ad targeting, what is more effective?
Big Data, you’ve heard about it by now, I’m sure. It means that everything we do, both online and offline, leaves traces. When you ”like” a tweet, make a purchase in a webshop, comment on someones Instagram picture, fill in an online questionnaire and just by carrying your smartphone with you everywhere you go, you leave footprints.
Since we have Big Data we can use it to segment our target groups even more than just by demography, interests or political view.
Let’s say that we are advertising our new laptop model. We want to target people who like computers, tech and so on. You and your spouse have the same interests and are in the same age. You both like computers, tech and want to have the latest models. You will both get the same ads on social media.
The thing that differs you is that you are impulsive and make purchases quick and your spouse does research on prices and get more info before making the decision to buy.
So, you both will get our ad with our new laptop model, but only one of you will probably convert.
How do we get accurate message out that increases the chance to get you both to convert?
We also put in the personality aspect in the targeting of our ads. By doing that we can tailor our messages and images to fit your personality types for a higher chance that you both will convert.
Different ad content
You, as an impulsive person, might get an ad with a strong CTA including a limited offer to get you to make a purchase now!
Your spouse might get an ad with a read more CTA that has more informative copy than yours and a totally different image.
To get her to take the step to make a purchase we can also remarket towards her if she visit our site only for getting more information. Maybe we even throw in a discount code to make her decision to buy easier the next time she visits Facebook.
Not the same reactions
Just because you have the same gender, the same interests or live in the same area it doesn’t mean you react in the same way. We are all individuals with different personalities, right. To target ads on social media as accurate as possible towards personality will give you better ad results.
I think that those who will start doing personality based advertising will have a big head start in their marketing campaigns on social media.
For Swedish readers: Read this article by Daniel Larsson about how Trump managed to win the US election with Facebook.
(If you want to learn more I recommend you to take a look at this study:Computer-based personality judgments are more accurate than those made by humans)