Your Data – The Fight For it is On!
The tech landscape is constantly changing and moving. What was important to the tech giants this year isn’t seen as such a focus for the next. However, what doesn’t really change is their pursuit of us, the consumer. In each decade of the tech revolution the tech giants have always pursued the consumer to buy or buy into their latest piece of technology or gadget.
Over the years the tech industry has become a bit of a ‘winner takes all’ industry. There is very little space for more than 2 or 3 competitors in the marketplace. Take, the late 90’s race to get everyone to buy your operating system. Because of software needs, the ability for the market to have more than one or two operating systems was limited. Therefore the company that was able to be the standard operating system was going to be huge. Hence the massive growth of Microsoft.
In 1995 Microsoft launched Window 95 and shipped over 40 million units in the first year. This put Microsoft in the home of a large number of people on the planet. Having everyone on your OS was seen as the key to making sure you sold your software and that was the vehicle that moved everything.
The 2nd OS War
However, that changed in 2007 with the launch of the iPhone. All of a sudden you didn’t need to have bought into a single operating system. You could have a system for your home and another for your mobile device. A new war emerged. One that had a new player, Google. Android and Apple slugged it out to get that all important space in your pocket. Both these companies post impressive numbers in this slugfest. Apple sold over 40.8 million units in the third Quarter of 2019. But Android, with its open operating system is by far the biggest player with over 352.4 million units in Q3 of 2019.
So what now? What are the tech giants after now? Well in our opinion, it’s the consumers themselves. Not the physical person, but their digital footprint. Data is now the biggest commodity in the tech world. The company that collects the most data on the most people is likely to come out on top. Why is this? Well, because if you understand the behaviour patterns of your consumers before anyone else does, you are more likely to be able to target them with the goods and services that they need.
Who’s Winning the Data War?
So who’s winning? It’s a little hard to tell and with a slew of anti-trust cases likely to rear its head, the tech giants might get stopped in their tracks. However with the introduction of smart home devices a new player has entered the game. Although they have been around for a long time, Amazon is possibly overlooked competitor in this space.
Amazon already has masses of data on it’s consumers through their marketplace. However they have started to expand their reach of data collection through their Alexa app & the devices it ships with. Only last year Amazon released over 5 different home and personal devices and their Echo brand is the current market leader with roughly 26.6% market share. Because these devices connect to your home as well as your phone they have a greater opportunity for data collection. They can tell what music you like, what TV you watch. They even know how hot you like your living room. What’s even more interesting is that Amazon has over the years developed the delivery method to ensure that if there is something you need they’ll be able to get it to you.
So, what does all this mean? Where are we likely to see this race for data collection going? Well, data without action isn’t very valuable. So expect to see a slew of new services. We have already seen this with Amazon, with the release of Prime Video, Music and even their focus on basics to service our product needs. All these services are driven by data. The data of what the consumer wants.
Where does this leave us?
From a marketing standpoint we can also expect to see advertising products becoming more and more sophisticated. Google, Facebook and the other tech giants have added to their advertising arsenal. But so has Amazon. Amazon has potentially the fastest growing advertising portfolio out there. Amazon’s ad business grew by 40% in 2019, far outstripping that of the nearest competitor in terms of growth. And why are they are able to deliver this advertising, data!
Expect to see the tech giants continue to try to occupy more areas of our lives. Whether it’s your Amazon account, your new Apple credit card or who you follow on Instagram, that knowledge of who you are and what you want is valuable and the tech companies are shaping up to capture as much of that data as possible.
We hope you found that interesting and informative. We build full funnel digital advertising campaigns that leverage all the data you have in your marketing stack. If you want to find out how we do this or if you just want to chat get in touch with us here.