Don’t give them your data.

I posted this as a comment in another sub but I think this can help a lot of people.

I work in marketing/advertising and I’m strongly considering a new career despite how garbage the job market is.

Believe me when I say: your data is your currency.

I talk to platform reps on a daily basis, including Hulu, Amazon, Meta, Reddit, Pinterest, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, TikTok (though who knows about those guys now). Trust me, the level of information available to target and sell directly to you is astronomical. And trust me when I say it works—no one likes to believe they’re susceptible to advertising, but everyone is.

When I started 10+ years ago, I loved the problem/solution aspect of the work. I love seeing creative come to life, working on shoots, making the clients happy. But the tech and targeting element of it all is so pervasive now, and it takes away the thrill of hoping something will work. We know it will, every time, because we have the data to prove it.

You’re not wrong to think it’s dirty. Delete your socials.

It’s worth mentioning that Reddit and their reps are my personal favorite, both because they’re extremely nice and helpful and because of the fact that this platform is contingent upon anonymity and information sharing. The platform has made mistakes in the past, but we cannot target based upon age, location, or gender on Reddit. It’s entirely interest-based, which to me lends itself to creating a strategy that’s actually centered on why products work for consumers.e