Between protecting customer data privacy and hyper-personalizing audience experiences, you can’t deny that modern digital marketing has become more complicated than ever. This is primarily due to the fact that the two concepts represent two sides of the same coin in digital marketing.
On the one hand, you have the task of providing customized consumer experiences, which is dependent on comprehensive consumer data. On the other hand, you must limit the collection of your customers’ data while also ensuring that the information they provide you is not mishandled or exploited.
As data-driven digital marketing professionals, your job no longer consists solely of developing sharp, insight-driven, creative campaigns. It also implies that you must implement specific measures to govern the collection, use, and storage of your customers’ data.
What exactly is customer data privacy?
But what exactly is data privacy, and why is it critical to protect your own and others’ data if you acquire it?
In general, data privacy is a subset of data security that is concerned with the proper handling of data. This includes consent, notice, and regulatory obligations designed to prevent data misuse and/or mishandling.
In general, data privacy and security entail the development of policies and procedures that ensure: legal and ethical data collection,
How data is collected and shared with third parties, as well as regulations and restrictions governing data and information handling.
So, if you focus specifically on customer data privacy, you can deduce that it is data privacy – its collection, handling, and regulation – concerning individuals who transact with a business.
These transactions can range from customer service inquiries to sales and marketing surveys, as well as other activities that require these individuals to share their personal information with your company.
How to safeguard customer data privacy?
These simple steps can be taken by both large and small businesses to better protect their customers’ personal information online with a digital marketing agency.
1. Learn about the laws that govern you.
The Data Privacy Act of 2012 is one of the cornerstone legislations in the Philippines aimed at protecting individuals’ personal information on and off the internet. This law outlines our local regulatory measures for personal information collection, storage, use, and sharing. It also includes information such as disciplinary actions and fines for violators.
The general data privacy principles and criteria for lawful information processing outlined below should guide your data processing for businesses. Allow these to serve as data privacy policy templates to help you implement them in your organizations.
2. Give them the option to opt-in or out of data collection.
Data collection should be completely optional as well. While forms are useful for generating leads and gathering as much relevant information as possible, you should allow your customers to share only what they are willing to share.
You can accomplish this by indicating which form fields are optional and which are required for data identification and attribution to the customer. If you’re a retailer and need your customer to fill out an order form, consider what information you’ll need to complete the transaction with a digital marketing agency.
3. Always practice transparency.
Transparency is the most effective way to gain trust.
Whatever reason you’re gathering information from your customers, make sure you communicate it clearly. After all, anything on which you are unwilling to shed light may sow doubt in the minds of your community of social media marketing.
Inserting fine print directly below your forms, or anywhere on the page where the form exists, is a quick way to accomplish this. It doesn’t have to be exhaustive, but it should quickly explain why you require the information for social media marketing.