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Offline matching and the catalog from Dell

A couple of weeks ago I saw an ad on my phone for the new Dell XPS laptop. Out of curiosity I clicked on it, and started configuring a couple of options just for fun. I read a lot of good reviews about the upcoming XPS laptop, how the design rivals that of Apple’s MacBook laptops, and how certain configurations come with Linux preinstalled. I played around with the options, and configured two beast laptops just for fun, then I left and have not thought about it anymore, since I am not in the market for a new laptop, being satisfied with my Surface 3 laptop and all.

A couple of weeks later, I received a Dell catalog for the first time, addressed to me and not to the usual “Current Resident”, that has more details about the XPS laptops, gaming laptops, desktops, and peripherals that Dell sells. The catalog also included a 15% discount, which was a nice touch.

I wondered how I got that catalog, even though I have not explicitly sign up for it, nor request one, nor provide any information while configuring the laptops on Dell’s website. Then I remembered offline matching.

There are offline matching data companies, that collect customer activity in the offline world, such as purchases associated with gift and loyalty cards from grocery stores, gas stations, brick and mortar retailers, etc., where names and addresses are available, and use a bridge between the online-offline world to match the activity online with that offline. The bridge can be an email address, a third-party cookie, swap ID-match, or a hashed ID, etc., and after bridging, the data on the customer activity is holistic. I bet that’s probably what happened, and I ended up getting the catalog.


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