One of the unique capabilities of behavioral targeting is its ability to anonymously track consumers' preferences as evidenced by their browsing of certain types of content. In movie marketing, for example, you can know who avid moviegoers are by their regular and repeated browsing of movie reviews. You can also know what kind of films or actors they appear to like by their focus on reviews within certain film genres or according to who is acting in the film. Since movie studios tend to have very narrow marketing windows, they need to be able to find and communicate to their best targets very quickly.

The quick win with behavioral has been to lump all moviegoers into one bucket, or perhaps to segment them according to their interest in a specific film genre, and then deliver the same movie message to all of them. This has proven quite successful, since that kind of targeting is certainly reaching the right people at the right time. However, it doesn't take advantage of the chance to make the messages even more relevant to the consumer -- and certainly more valuable to the advertiser -- by delivering different creatives for the same movie to different audience segments.

For example, for the release of a new action thriller starring Tom Cruise, browsers who fall into the action-drama segment should be shown creative that speaks to the film genre, maybe featuring a car chase scene.

Creative mock-up for an ad promoting film by name

Artist's conceptualization: not a real ad

Browsers who fall into the Tom Cruise-fan segment should get served creative with his face or name as the dominant element of the ad. A generic movie creative is likely to work with both segments, but a devout Tom Cruise fan is certainly more likely to engage with an ad that features him.

Creative mock-up for an ad promoting film by actor

Artist's conceptualization: not a real ad