There’s a short story for kids titled – The Gingerbread Man. It’s a very commonly narrated story of how a ginger-bread comes alive and hops away escaping being eaten by the grandma who baked him. The story follows that everyone, the ginger-bread man encounters wants to eat him and they chase after him starting with the little old woman followed by the little old man, a pig, a cow, a horse, and finally a smart fox who cunningly eats him. Now, this is not just a story but also meant to be a memory game for toddlers. They have to remember accurately everyone who chased after the gingerbread man that too in the same sequence as in the story.
Blockchain technology works on similar but not the same lines. It is the mastermind of a person or a group who goes by the name Satoshi Nakamoto. Technically, this technology is a series of unalterable records of transactions digitally time-stamped, with each new data being bound to all previous data, managed by a cluster of computers under different entities, hence, decentralized, forming an interconnected chain and accessible to all involved.
The benefits of blockchain technology over other contemporary forms of digital transactions and data maintenance are many which primarily include:
- Decentralized record keeping which makes data independently verifiable.
- Unalterable blocks indicating you need to change the entire chain in order to make the tiniest of changes in a single block which is so complicated that it’s impossible to do so without having serious consequences.
- Easily accessible as data can be viewed by anyone involved and that too right up to its point of origin eliminating any ambiguity.
- No cost transactions which means peer-to-peer transaction data process and analysis without involving any third party.
Blockchain technology is yet to come into the mainstream but even in its nascent stage what are the possible implications of the above benefits on the marketing industry? Here are a few of them:
Consumer Discretion
Also known as democratic marketing where the decision to view an advertisement is completely at the discretion of consumers. In fact, marketers can compensate consumers in exchange for viewing their ads and accumulating consumer data for market trend analysis. The decentralized approach also aids in easily connecting with the target audience.
Cost Saving
Another benefit of consumer discretion is cost saving on third parties who are usually responsible for digital ad tracking. Also eliminates the probability of inefficient tracking as blockchain data is directly accessible to marketers eventually making the ROI of ads more accurately derivable.
Dependability
The marketing industry has perpetually devised strategies to gain and sustain the trust of consumers. Now, blockchain technology has provided a perfect platform to do just that. If a marketing campaign endorses a product giving out information about its origins and making process that is the USP of that particular label then blockchain information makes it completely cross verifiable owing to its distinctive trait of storing and providing information dating back to its origin. Consumers find this corroboration very affirming and will most likely buy that product.
Smart Contracts
These are digital legal documents designed to dictate the factors that will predetermine the moment of payment to parties in contract on completion of the job. So, smart contracts are not a literal contract per se but a set of instructions that will predetermine the time of payment as per the original contract on satisfactory delivery of work. The payout will be automated as specified in the smart contract embedded in the blockchain. This will hugely encourage accountability for work.
Real-Time
Beyond the above-mentioned perks, the most sought after the advantage of blockchain technology by all businesses is simplified payment processing using cryptocurrency. Payouts are made effective with the help of smart contracts. Payments can be done in real-time between parties without any delay on account of activities like invoice processing, updating of records at both ends, and any other paperwork. Since both parties are on the same platform with easy and immediate access to the same data, payments can be done without delay i.e. in real-time.
A lot of research is going into further developing this technology. Ethereum, Ripple, Fabric, and Corda are few examples of blockchains being incorporated by many companies. IBM and R3 are examples of companies among many others who are developing blockchain technology for giants like AT&T. Blockchains provide solutions to age-old problems that still haunt organizations like ad frauds, consumer data security, and third party hassles. It also bypasses social platforms like Facebook and Instagram where user activity is monitored to collect user data without their permission with non-anonymity being an added pain point.
Blockchain technology has a lot more potential than already discussed and given the benefits, has the potential to dominate the future of marketing and for that matter, any industry.
