The Pellucid Perspective - April 2017 - 9

Brooks Brothers, Orvis and Vineyards Vines - all of which are
paying "remarketing" fees so their ads follow me virtually anywhere I go on the internet. If I give somebody my email address
through a purchase or registration, the process is even easier.
In self-defense, golf courses need to pay attention to all
these changes and the rise in MAC address usage for customer
identification. For example, if you want to set up a "free WiFi" service for your clubhouse as a customer amenity similar to
what Starbucks and hotels have done, you can contact a well
funded startup that will establish the service for you in less than
30 minutes. Beyond that, they will provide a basic customer
profile of name, age, sex and location
for every email address you collect (in
many cases, emails you already have).
If that isn't enough, they can tell you
when that customer walks in and how
many times they've been to your course
before. They also then provide a much
more personalized email service that
is less likely to be filtered or identified
by an ISP as SPAM to encourage golfers to return. This service may not fully
reach its potential until it is integrated
with POS database platforms, but golf
courses may not want to wait for some
of the typically slow moving golf POS
platforms to realize how much more
important MAC addresses will become.
As technology continues to evolve
so fast and get even more integral to
our activities, it's important to realize
that integration becomes increasingly
difficult and execution is far from perfect. Ever since I went on the Orvis site
to look for a new briefcase in February, they have been paying remarketing
fees to have their selection of laptop
cases follow me around - why can't they
figure out that they sent me an email
confirmation of my purchase in early
March?
The last thing I will point out is that
it's pretty apparent that search engine
browsers are laughing all the way to the
bank - especially Google as the leading
(and most integrated) trafficker in consumer data on the internet. You would
think that this would lead to a consumer revolt as we realize these platforms
are making billions selling our collective personal data. In reality, the current
trends demonstrate that most of us are
willing to trade our personal information to get the information and other
stuff we want and be able to get directions and share our lives on social mewww.PellucidCorp.com

dia. And then most of us throw up our hands when we realize
we don't understand how all this stuff is being done.
To paraphrase Jim Koppenhaver at our recent State of the
Industry, "You can't put the genie back in the bottle." The trick
will be to be careful what you wish for and how to use multiple
genies wisely. Even some Nigerian Prince of Hackers selling
my email address to a Canadian chiropractor apparently isn't a
high enough price to make me install a VPN or some other stuff
that will restrict my ability to get what I want on the internet,
but that doesn't mean I won't try to find better ways to protect
myself and use emerging tools to help.
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The Pellucid Perspective - April 2017
