Big Data

One of the major trends over the past few years in marketing research is the use of “Big data”. This is data, usually collected at individual customer level across a variety of platforms – online and offline, which gets merged into a “big dataset” to create a quite detailed picture of customer behavior.

Have a look at the following NY Times article, which gives a very nice overview of how “big data” is used by marketers. 

• What are the opportunities for marketers associated with using this type of data? How reliable/useful are these types of analyses?
• In your opinion, are there any ethical concerns when using this type of data? What are some of these ethical risks – and what could be done about it?