MediaTel

One of the biggest opportunities for advertisers at the moment is one to one communication with a consumer, according to Chris Worrell, European research director at Specific Media.

Speaking at MediaTel's Future of Media Research event last Friday, Worrell said this is becoming a reality because we have access to so much data. "Consumers are always 'on' now - at home and out, because of devices like mobile phones and tablets," he said. "Brands can push the right message, at the right time of day, to the right screen."

James Smythe (pictured), owner of Culture of Insight, agreed that digital is accelerating the learning experience but says targeting has always been there - citing ads for cornflakes on the radio in the morning as an example. He believes that it is about "getting to the right point... targeting isn't pure, it's all about compass bearings", though he admitted that "digital offers lots of behavioural information, which is very tangible".

Worrell explained the need for a new language with targeting. "Demographics go out of the window - the audience changes based on the consumer and what they're doing in real time," he said. Worrell thinks digital offers a "fantastic ability" to know and understand your consumers, using the 'ash cloud' issues in 2010 to describe how brands could directly target groups of people based on a common behaviour. "Digital allows you to tap right into that and do something really quickly... build up information on a consumer, follow them all the way through and then serve them relevant ads," he said.

However, Sarah Messer, head of commercial research & insight at ITV, added: "I haven't seen much evidence that shows that targeting is effective... and TV targeting, for example, would be technically very difficult." Jim Kite, strategic development director at Starcom MediaVest Group, pointed out that targeting is not relevant for every medium. "Television advertising is so successful because of scale and size - and the surprise factor," he said.

Kite also expressed concerns around the content of targeted ads - "it is easy to change things on digital but not as easy with other mediums like television".  He said targeting and personalisation is seen as the future, but he is "not so sure" - "I think there needs to be a balance".

John Carroll, senior director at Ipsos MediaCT, also wondered how certain the industry is that consumers want this? And suggested that tech savvy consumers will be able to block ads. Carroll believes that consumers should be able to choose the advert, rather than the other way around. "It's not a million miles away," he said.