AT&T Boss Randall Stephenson’s Big Data Strategy
“Consumer privacy is “the issue of the day,” AT&T’s Stephenson has said”
While AT&T Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Randall Stephens spoke at Vanity Fair’s New Establishment Summit in Los Angeles Wednesday, he was clearly very aware of the debate over consumer privacy in Washington.
Using consumer data to boost ad sales is a central focus of AT&T’s purchase of Time Warner for $85.4 billion, or $108.7 billion including the assumed debt. Stephenson said that DirecTV has been able to charge two to three times the amount that legacy media can bill for advertising, because the data AT&T can glean from its network helps advertisers to focus their ads. AT&T plans to use its consumer data to drive a similar increase in the ad rates that Time Warner charges for Turner’s networks.
Media and tech companies need to think about how they deal with consumer privacy in general, Stephenson suggested. “The world is moving to place [that] a lot people in this room would not like,” he said, an “opt-in world” in which consumers have to give approval for how corporations use their data.
AT&T has experimented with giving customers financial incentives in exchange for using their information in Austin, Texas, he said. For high-speed broadband connections that cost $100 per month, AT&T has offered a discounted rate of $70 if the customer allows the telecom to use their data to sell ads. Acceptance rates have been from 94% to 96%, Stephenson said.
As privacy concerns around data collection raise across all areas of every market, companies must find ways to incentivize consumers to share their data. Big data can provide extremely valuable insights to companies regarding their target markets and customers, and if the industry wants to move forward, the collection of data cannot stop here. In the future, we will look to see more and more companies find creative ways to reward their customers for sharing their data, much like AT&T.
The Amazing Ways Burberry Is Using Artificial Intelligence And Big Data To Drive Success
“Using AI to boost sales”
Burberry does this by asking customers to voluntarily share data through a number of loyalty and reward programs. This information is used to offer personalized recommendations, online and in store. When an identified customer enters a store, sales assistants use tablets to offer buying suggestions based on their customers’ purchase history as well as their social media activity.If Burberry knows that a customer has recently bought a particular coat, for example, then assistants may be encouraged by the app to show them a handbag which is popular with other buyers of the coat.
One specific insight was the impact that product images had on sales of items that performed well in-store but not so well online. By creating new images for products where the data showed this was occurring, the company saw a 100% increase in sales for one particular bag.
Here, we see another example of incentivizing consumers to allow the company to collect data. Not only this, but the reward given to the customer provides a very personalized experience with recommendations. With the data collected from this program, Burberry saw an opportunity to update images on their website to boost sales, which it did.
Even college baseball teams are now embracing the big data approach
“Big data will revolutionize all aspects of society”
The pitcher comes set. Enacts his delivery. His offering sails wide of the plate. Just like the last one, he thinks. He checks over his shoulder, glancing at the scoreboard that displays the strike zone, the pitch speed, and the exit velocity of batted balls. Yup. Instant feedback and validation, right there, right as soon as the ball leaves his hand. To think, this is only practice — yet all this information is available so readily
The big data approach to baseball has gone to college.
The Iowa Hawkeyes have transitioned from a non-entity to one of the best programs in the Big Ten conference since head coach Rick Heller took over in 2013. Iowa has won 30-plus games in each of Heller’s four seasons, that after winning 30 in just two of the previous 14 years. Last spring, the Hawkeyes won their first conference tournament in school history, and in August they became the first American representative to win a medal in the World University Games.
“I do believe that some portion of our success can be attributed to the technology we have and how we implement it into our development,” Druschel said, crediting Heller for building the program in numerous ways. The University is a fan of Heller, too. Iowa has renovated its stadium — installing new Astroturf, a new scoreboard — and continues to splurge on amenities that used to seem beyond the scope of big-league teams, let alone college programs.
Missouri’s greatest advantage over the other teams pursuing the same information and training edge is an easy one to overlook: an analytics staff. “There aren’t many Division I programs that have Trackman, let alone have an analytical team who can make sense of Trackman on a deeper level besides spin rate and the basic stuff that Trackman reports”, Lawson said. “We’re able to get into it deeper and so it’s one thing that allows us to stand out.”
Slowly, big data analytics is being adopted by clubs across a variety of sports. College baseball, is pushing farther than many others by deploying an actual analytics staff to help understand the statistics and performance of every player. This gives any team utilizing data a competitive advantage over other teams, as the data allows them to target weak points of their playing quickly, and find out truly what needs to be done to be successful.
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