Digital Targeting Creeps Out Customers

When personalized ads get too intrusive, consumers are less likely to buy

Based on the research of Wayne Hoyer

Years into the grand experiment of personalized digital marketing, most of us have had the experience: You search for a product — or just casually mention it. Suddenly, ads for that exact item stalk you across apps, websites, and social media. The targeting may be technically impressive, but it can feel unsettling.

That uneasy sentiment is the center of new research by Wayne Hoyer, professor of marketing and James L. Bayless/W.S. Farish Fund Chair for Free Enterprise at the McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas at Austin. He finds that when digital personalization crosses perceived boundaries, it triggers a powerful emotional response, which he calls “creepiness.” That response can backfire on digital marketers by materially reducing consumers’ willingness to buy.

The study, conducted by Hoyer and three marketing researchers from the University of Bern in Switzerland — Alisa Petrova, Lucia Malär, and Harley Krohmer — argues that creepiness is not a property of digital marketing itself. Instead, it is a structured emotional episode that unfolds inside the consumer in response to marketing.

The response has two parts: feeling ambiguous about what’s behind a marketing message, then deciding it’s a threatening form of surveillance.

“When consumers are exposed to these ads, they make an assessment of ambiguity, such as, ‘What is this?’ and whether this is intrusive surveillance, such as, ‘Are they watching me?’” Hoyer explains.

“If the answer is yes, this creates a negative emotion that can negatively affect purchase intentions.”

Particular about Privacy

In three studies involving 1,800 participants, the researchers exposed some people to targeted ads for headphones and sneakers — for example, seeing unsolicited ads shortly after talking about the product. Those subjects rated how uncomfortable they felt and why.

The studies compared their reactions with those of control groups that weren’t digitally targeted. The results confirmed that creepiness is real and alienates potential customers.

• Perceptions of ambiguity and surveillance explained 75% of the emotional discomfort consumers reported.
• Personalized ads nearly doubled levels of feeling surveilled compared with nonpersonalized ads.
• On a 7-point scale for intent to purchase, each 1-point increase in consumer reactance reduced willingness to buy by about half a point.

Certain audience segments were especially vulnerable to feelings of creepiness. People who were more skeptical of advertising or more fearful of technological overreach were significantly more likely to interpret personalization as ambiguous and intrusive.

“Consumers do not like to be watched,” Hoyer says. “This is perceived as an invasion of privacy.”

Countering Creepiness: Try Kittens

What can brands do to mitigate feelings of creepiness?

In a final experiment, the researchers tested a variety of remedies, such as transparency about data use, assurances of good intentions, offers of discounts, and charitable donations. They also tried including positive emotional images in ads: pictures of kittens.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the kittens proved somewhat effective at de-creeping consumer reactions and softening damage to their plans to buy. Offering monetary compensation also helped.

Overall, however, even the best interventions made only limited improvements to purchase intentions. Hoyer says, “Creepiness is robust and difficult to mitigate once triggered.”

This means that prevention is key, he says. It’s more effective to avoid creating bad feelings in the first place than try to repair them after the fact.

“Managers should focus on prevention by designing personalization practices that minimize ambiguity and try to avoid signals of intrusive surveillance,” Hoyer says.

The study suggests developing a Creepiness Level Index as a tool to help marketers track negative reactions to digital ads.

Over the long run, though, the marketing risk might diminish, he adds. “It is possible that creepiness will decline as consumers become more used to personalization and more accepting of AI technology.”

“The Phenomenon of Creepiness in a Digital Marketing World” is published in Psychology & Marketing.

Story by Kiah Collier