SBP 165: The Sharp Cut - Right Message Wrong Everything: The Truth About 1:1 Targeting.

Welcome to the first Sharp Cut from The Sleeping Barber Podcast — a tighter, opinion-led format designed to challenge marketing’s most persistent assumptions.

In this episode, Vassilis and Marc take on one of the industry’s most widely accepted beliefs: one-to-one personalization.

Despite overwhelming surveys claiming consumers want personalization and businesses need it, the evidence tells a very different story. Drawing on peer-reviewed research from Ehrenberg-Bass, MIT, Melbourne Business School, Nielsen, and the Journal of Advertising Research, this Sharp Cut separates belief from evidence.

They unpack why personalization systems are built on inaccurate data, why targeting errors compound rather than optimize, why click-through rates are meaningless, and how narrow targeting actively undermines growth by excluding future buyers.

Most importantly, they outline what actually works: reach, creative quality, mental availability, contextual relevance, and proper experimentation.

If you care about effectiveness over mythology, this episode is for you.

Chapters:
00:00 - Introduction
04:13 - Beliefs vs. Evidence
07:48 - The Targeting Effectiveness Evidence
11:07 - The Compound Problem
12:54 - The Measurement Illusion
14:47 - The Hidden cost of Narrow Targeting
17:21 - What Actually Works
20:00 - Our Final Take

Key Takeaways
Personalization is widely believed, not well proven. Most supporting stats come from surveys and vendor case studies, not controlled experiments.

Data accuracy is poor. Identity and attribute targeting accuracy often ranges between 32–69%, with many segments no better than a coin flip.

Targeting errors compound. Stacking multiple “precise” attributes multiplies mistakes, not accuracy—often reaching less than 15% of the intended audience.

Third-party targeting performs no better than random. This holds true in both B2C and B2B contexts, even for senior decision-makers.

CTR is a vanity metric. Studies show click-through rates have near-zero correlation with brand outcomes or ROI.

Narrow targeting hurts growth. It focuses spend on the ~5% in-market while excluding the 95% who drive future demand.

What works instead:
--- Reach over precision
--- Context over profile
--- First-party data for retention, not acquisition
--- Creative as the real targeting lever
--- Measurement tied to business outcomes
--- Controlled testing with holdouts