Online Behavior Advertising (OBA) describes a process in which companies try to play out relevant content or ads by obtaining user data. This can happen, for example, through cookies on websites. This marketing method is based on cookie technology.
This type of advertising can also be called “Behavioral Targeting”.
Onlinemarketing-Praxis defines behavioral targeting as follows:
Behavioral targeting relies on the analysis of the surfing behavior of an Internet user. For this purpose, for example, the click paths of an anonymous user profile are analyzed.
If the user spends more time on websites that deal with the subject of “cars”, advertisements from car manufacturers can be displayed because of this past surfing behaviour. Behavioral targeting is based on cookie technology, which analyses the content of websites visited by users and their interaction with advertising banners. On the basis of this data, a specific advertisement is displayed to the user. In this case, the temporal component plays a decisive role: advertising that is displayed to the user after the purchase is no longer relevant for him.
With OBA, companies do not know any personal data such as name, address or telephone number. Using a randomly generated ID number, an attempt is made to estimate the demographic background on the basis of surfing behaviour.
Relevant Factors for Online Behavior Advertising
- Age group (e.g. 18-25 years)
- Gender (male or female)
- Buying interests (e.g. car accessories or clothing)
This targeted approach to interest groups can lead to a considerable minimization of advertising wastage. By knowing customer needs, content and advertising can be adapted to them.
Behavior Advertising on Amazon
Advertisements on Amazon function predominantly only at the keyword level, i.e. when campaigns are created, Amazon keywords are stored on which advertising is to be placed when a search query is made, as is the case, for example, with Amazon Marketing Services. Amazon decides on the basis of some performance metrics whether the stored keyword is relevant and whether an ad will be broadcast. At the moment it is hardly possible to track the activities of users on Amazon with the help of cookies in order to obtain more information from potential customers.
Amazon is already making initial advances into reaching customers outside of Amazon with Amazon AAP. Furthermore, a pilot project is currently underway in the USA for Amazon sellers who want to gain access to the Amazon Extended Ad Network and also target customers outside of Amazon with advertising.