MisTargeted

Earlier, I was listening to the song Diablo Rojo, by Rodrigo y Gabriela. But the interesting thing was, when I clicked on the tab for the YouTube video, this is what popped up:

I am not Hispanic. I don’t speak Spanish, and when I hear it over my headphones, it takes me till the end of the video to even realize that the ad is about Target. But the reason why they played this commercial for me makes sense.

After all, Diablo Rojo is a Mexican band, and so it makes sense that the audience watching the video would also be Mexican. It’s this concept that I would like to focus on: not the Mexican aspect, but the idea of customer profiling, to appeal to the people most likely watching that at the time.

This style of marketing is present at all times. You don't want to waste advertising money on an audience who wouldn’t want to buy the product, or, worse, who wouldn’t understand the language of the product. This example above is only the one that made me think of it at the time.

This is just one of many tactics used to “cut through the clutter” of marketing, by making each ad personalized for the likely consumer. And unlike many kinds of very annoying tactics, I don't really mind this one. After all, if the advertiser knows what I want, that also means I will be advertised what I want to buy.

And although the amount of information the world has on me is sometimes kind of scary, little mistargeted ads like this help give me relief.