What's Floating Around Cloud 9? 3 December 2018

Welcome to another week and the countdown to the Big Day! We can't quite believe how quickly this year has gone, but certainly this time last year all of the chatter was about GDPR and were we prepared for it moving forward, following the law change back in May.

Here at Cloud 9 Towers we duly did our research and undertook training to make sure that we were compliant should any issues arrive, but six months on, has anyone really noticed any major changes in how we all operate?We are still getting unsolicited emails, and occasionally we do ask to be removed from lists, but we did that before anyway. 

The level of hysteria around GDPR which was a bit like that of the Millennium Bug a few years ago, has been embraced by some but clearly ignored by many. However the reality is that its all so complex that the formal legislation will take years to implement and enforce properly and however prepared we are, or think we are, we probably are not prepared at all.  If that doesn't make sense try reading it through in full - you would need to be a legal expert to truly understand it.

Instead of relying only on targeted advertising, marketers have been forced to rethink their approach and because of this, personalisation in marketing has grown. Since GDPR became enforceable, the number of third-party cookies found on news websites in Europe has declined by 22%, according to a study by Reuters Institute, meaning marketers really have changed the way they track consumers.

The fuller effects of GDPR are perhaps more likely to be felt much further down the line and months ahead as people either become complacent, or decide to ignore the law and its perhaps less of an issue on our industry as its very people focused and B2B orientated. 

Ask how many suppliers business cards any agent has and they will probably tell you hundreds if not thousands and most of these probably end up in a box or a drawer. However, ask the same question to suppliers and you will probably find agents names on a mailing list, whether they met them at a trade show or a forum or if they have been scanned. 

Ironically enough, we still get the odd email from a supplier where we are just one of an endless list of agents who have been cc'd in and we always wonder what has happened to the person who hit send! Did the GDPR police come and take them away?!

 

 With Christmas just around the corner and festive campaigns well underway, most mail houses are currently seasonally busy but we do wonder how Santa is getting on now he has to be GDPR compliant?

Have a great week #eventprofs