3.3: Big data, analytics, and audience targeting

Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Data analytics graphic illustration. (Free-to-use from Unsplash; Choong Deng Xiang)

Media writers and producers have access to vast amounts of data. As part of your information gathering duties, you may be expected to gather and analyze data about audiences, media and social media trends, story topics, interviewees, marketplaces, brands, products, etc. Media professionals use data for all sorts of creative purposes.

This section looks at how to connect information gathering best practices in mass communication with big data on a practical level. It is broken down by subfield to make it accessible. Some topics may be covered in multiple sections because different subfields offer different context.

Journalism

For journalists, access to big data means they have more powerful tools to practice investigative journalism. This article about the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in analyzing big data to facilitate investigative journalism notes how journalists tracked Israeli bombings of Gaza using AI.

"The paper’s journalists used artificial intelligence to track satellite images that showed more than 200 craters in densely populated civilian areas, which experts say are likely caused by 907-kilogram (2,000-pound) bombs."

The article goes on to state that AI might enable more journalists even in smaller news organizations to do the types of investigative journalism only previously possible in large newsrooms with large staffs.

Investigative Reporters and Editors, a leading group that supports the practice of using data to report on impactful stories, breaks the process down into four essential steps:

1. asking a question
2. gathering appropriate data
3. cleaning and analyzing the data, and
4. doing further reporting and writing of the story.

For more information about how data journalists are working to effectively and ethically use AI, read this article from the Global Investigative Journalism Network.

The data gathering and analytics tools available to journalists are too numerous to mention here, and new ones are being developed all the time. Suffice it to say that students interested in data journalism may want to add learning the computer programming language Python and the R statistical package to their repertoires.

A good list of resources for journalists interested in doing data journalism can be found at this page by the Public Media Alliance.

Advertising

For advertisers, access to "big data" and the tools to analyze data has changed the game. Being able to analyze large amounts of consumer data means advertisers can target audiences not just by demographic characteristics but based on behavioral tendencies and likely behaviors. Advertisers now have the ability to target individuals with unforeseen precision. For example, they can target not just women in their early 30s who own a home but rather can specifically target women in their early 30s living in certain ZIP codes with certain income levels, with one or more children, who have visited an upscale clothing store in the past two weeks, who use Pinterest, who appear to be renovating their kitchen and are likely to buy new appliances in the next four weeks.

That level of hyper-targeting is incredibly valuable and powerful. It enables advertisers to reach more or less the exact audience they want at the opportune time when they are making purchase decisions.

However, that same level of persuasive power can be disruptive, even destructive in electoral politics, which is, of course, heavily influenced by advertising.

For example, Cambridge Analytica shared Facebook user data with the Trump campaign in 2016. Before falling back on trope that "all's fair in love and politics," consider this statement from a Vox article on the scandal: "Facebook allowed a third-party developer to engineer an application for the sole purpose of gathering data. And the developer was able to exploit a loophole to gather information on not only people who used the app but all their friends — without them knowing."

The data was used to build profiles for millions of voters, which could be used to target their behavior. Cambridge Analytica also facilitated an illegal relationship between a Super PAC and the Trump campaign, according to this article from Campaign Legal Center. Advertisers in the coming decades can expect to grapple with the ethical challenges of audience targeting.

That said, audiences appreciate relevant messages.

As the Center for Media Engagement at the University of Texas at Austin puts it, "if advertising is unavoidable, it makes sense to at least have advertising that is relevant to us. In fact, such targeted advertising can be helpful in many ways, rather than just tolerable."

But the same article sums up our fears as consumers that the practice may not be ethical simply because it requires access to and analysis of deeply personal, previously private information in order to work.

Public relations

For public relations professionals, access to vast amounts and types of consumer data and the ability to conduct advanced analytics presents the ability to not only test messages but to target that testing like never before. Brands and institutions want to know everything from which platforms their intended audiences use most to which word choices are most likely to be effective.

Definition: Message Testing

In marketing and public relations, message testing refers to the practice of presenting different versions of a persuasive message to targeted audiences in order to gather feedback about how receptive they are to the premise, structure, wording, length, and platform of the message. In simple terms, message testing measures how well audiences understand persuasive messages and which ones they are most likely to like, dislike, respond to, etc.

The way promotional messages are written is important. Creative success in this area can make a significant difference in what people think about a brand, industry, or institution, and this can equate to greater power, influence and success. There is more to successful messaging than creative writing and message testing.

Consider this quote from a paper put out by the Institute for Public Relations: "A common misconception holds that 'messaging' is a purely creative endeavor based on clever phrasing, brilliant visuals and edgy disruptive execution. While creativity certainly plays an important part, successful messaging is as much science as art; and the required science actually enhances the creative process by focusing resources on those messaging opportunities with the highest potential. All of these tools can mean a more catered, personal media consumption experience, but they can also mean the death of privacy as an individual's media use data can easily be tied to their movement, shopping, and purchase habits as well as their proclivities."

The ethical concerns in public relations are similar to those in advertising with an added caveat. In addition to working with consumer data, public relations professionals often gather large amounts of mass media and social media content to analyze how much their organization is being talked about and what is being said. While it is possible to track the success of a message or a campaign, public relations professionals should not mislead their partners, internal or external, into thinking that they can control the narrative at all times.

Human communication and behavior are constantly being influenced by numerous variables. No public relations writer or firm can predict them all.

Ethics of audience targeting

The ethics of targeted advertising, analyzed in this case study, have been discussed at length in recent years and are applicable across subfields in mass communication. From the consumer's perspective, it comes down to the convenience and usefulness of targeted advertising versus the damage that can be done when their privacy is breached.

There have been astonishing cases of trauma made worse by hyper-targeted ads. The example in the case study linked just above mentions a woman who had a miscarriage but who continued to see maternity ads on her social media feeds. This type of targeted messaging was both too aware and not aware enough at the same time. Advertisers had just enough information about this individual to add to her trauma.

Not only are circumstances like this bad for business, in the long run they are likely bad for society. Media writers must exercise extreme care and caution when working with data to create and disseminate targeted messages. The people on the receiving end are not an imaginary audience. They are individuals who can be helped or hurt by what you write.

Thought Exercise

Do social media apps seem to be able to predict your physical or mental state, your behavior and preferences? This is because cross referenced data including your demographic information, behavioral data, data about about your movements and travel, your beliefs, hobbies, purchasing habits, and even how you well you sleep at night can all be used to predict your behavior.

Consider carefully what you share and how you interact online.

The University of West Virginia's Information Technology Services has a list of suggestions for individuals who want to protect their online privacy. It has been modified to fit this space:

1. Don’t overshare information on social media.

2. Collect only essential information in your professional capacity as media workers.

3. Use incognito or private browsing in your personal internet use.

4. Limit app access to personal data by opting out of nonessential data sharing choices.

5. Change your privacy settings and check them often for apps, websites, and devices you use often.

For more help, ITS at West Virginia writes: "The National Cybersecurity Alliance has a helpful Manage Your Privacy Settings page with links to dozens of popular services."