Why Spend Ad Dollars If You're Not Learning Anything? Here's A Solution.

I caught Jebbit co-founder Jonathan Lacoste on CNBC early yesterday morning at Equinox (I was on the stairmaster and the other channels available were on commercial).  But his interview on Squawk Box was actually really interesting -- maybe because my colleagues and I are deep in the trenches of a Digital Marketing class at Columbia, but I think moreso because Lacoste's company is collecting customers at a steady clip by asking online consumers to willingly hand over valuable preference data to brands.  Jebbit calls this exchange "post-click engagement," and I think it's really smart.


Here's how it works: the company creates an overlay on brand landing pages that asks a potential customer, once s/he clicks on an ad for a product, a set of questions (anything a brand wants to know) and then "rewards" that customer with a coupon or a prize once the mini-survey is complete.  The result?  The brand gets a little insight into what kinds of customer is browsing, and the customer gets a bargain.  Everybody wins!

I think this tactic is particularly interesting because I would actually do it.  I often say I would never click a digital banner, but now well know that I probably do.  But I definitely ignore pre-roll on videos, and click away from disruptive display ad as often as possible.  This, I would do.  Lacoste has said his company's core principal is asking the question, "Why spend ad dollars if people aren't learning what you want them to learn?"  He boasts clients such as Reebok, Zipcar and Microsoft, but I imagine more big brands will be signing on soon.