Customer acquisition tactics has seen some major changes in the recent era, the depth of personalization has gone so deep and all thanks goes to technology. Last night, one of Zomato users who paid via net banking was shocked to receive a SMS from PayTM.
I ordered food from @zomato and paid via net banking. Now I get this text from @Paytm. Is Zomato trading my order details with Paytm? WTF. pic.twitter.com/BtDzpXvg4x
— Shubhashish (@shubHASHISH) November 17, 2016
He immediately roped in both Vijay Shekhar Sharma and Deepinder Goyal to explain the situation as PayTM message exactly specified what he ordered to check if Zomato was trading his orders to PayTM. There were other users who jumped into the conversation.
@akm1410 @shubHASHISH @vijayshekhar @deepigoyal That’s a bizarre acceptance of a privacy breach.
— Abhishek P (@shakeyiyer) November 17, 2016
It was clear that the user was not using PayTM at that point of time and his data reaching the company was clearly a privacy breach for him.
@shubHASHISH @shakeyiyer @akm1410 @deepigoyal who said that ??? Why will we buy any outside data????
— Vijay Shekhar (@vijayshekhar) November 17, 2016
@shubHASHISH @shakeyiyer @akm1410 @deepigoyal
we didn’t buy data.
— Vijay Shekhar (@vijayshekhar) November 17, 2016
And that’s when Deepinder Goyal jumped into the conversation.
@vijayshekhar @shubHASHISH @shakeyiyer @akm1410 sir. If someone is ready to sell their soul, doesn’t mean that should buy it.
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) November 17, 2016
@vijayshekhar @shubHASHISH @shakeyiyer @akm1410 this is poor user experience, our users are getting confused about payment options.
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) November 17, 2016
@vijayshekhar @shubHASHISH @shakeyiyer @akm1410 Look up to you as a role model. Please remain one :-). Growth at all costs is not good.
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) November 17, 2016
@vijayshekhar @shubHASHISH @shakeyiyer @akm1410 so you will stoop to someone else’s level? That’s what this has come down to now? ??????
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) November 17, 2016
@deepigoyal I just spoke with the restaurant. They say don’t accept cards, have no POS machine. Pay only via Zomato. @vijayshekhar @akm1410
— Shubhashish (@shubHASHISH) November 17, 2016
@shubHASHISH @deepigoyal @vijayshekhar ah. This clears things. Restaurant is not sending you that PayTM SMS then
— Ashish K. Mishra (@akm1410) November 17, 2016
@shubHASHISH @deepigoyal @vijayshekhar also clearly this is a private transaction between You, Zomato and restaurant. How does PayTM enter?
— Ashish K. Mishra (@akm1410) November 17, 2016
@shubHASHISH @akm1410 @vijayshekhar they don’t have access to anything which doesn’t go through them.
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) November 17, 2016
@apurv289 @vijayshekhar @shubHASHISH @shakeyiyer @akm1410 I have a hunch it is the pos company behind this.
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) November 17, 2016
@shubHASHISH @deepigoyal @akm1410 ?????really !! When?
— Vijay Shekhar (@vijayshekhar) November 17, 2016
@shubHASHISH @deepigoyal @akm1410 cool. Going offline. Late in a diff time zone.
— Vijay Shekhar (@vijayshekhar) November 17, 2016
@shubHASHISH @vijayshekhar @akm1410 We don’t even trigger that for a user. It’s the users choice. Btw, we have zero COD right now.
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) November 17, 2016
@apurv289 @vijayshekhar @akm1410 @shubHASHISH shouldn’t it be the other way around. Select to send SMS?
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) November 17, 2016
@akm1410 @shubHASHISH I rest my case. On a separate note, we should be concerned. Our country’s future leaders are no better.
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) November 17, 2016
After clearing Zomato’s name and resting his case, Deepinder Goyal left the conversation but the other users were still trying to detect the privacy breach.
@amtsam @deepigoyal @vijayshekhar @shubHASHISH @shakeyiyer This is absolutely baseless We hv marketplace model where merchant select service
— Apurv Patel (@apurv289) November 17, 2016
@atulsian yep. Paytm notification says pay to petpooja. Thanks! @deepigoyal @akm1410
— Shubhashish (@shubHASHISH) November 17, 2016
The conversation did not end last night, some users jumped in even today morning to understand the matter.
@shubHASHISH so basically 2 things 1. Petpooja sells customer data & hs provisioning for that in their software 2. Paytm buys that data.
— Amit (@amtsam) November 18, 2016
@r0unak Yes. POS PetPooja sold “ad tagging rights” to Paytm. Privay part needs to be investigated. @Zomato @Paytm @deepakabbot
— Shubhashish (@shubHASHISH) November 18, 2016
In the age of digital marketing and targeted advertising, this is not new. Personalization adds more meaning and gives more opening to long term relationship, but sometimes the level of personalization goes from customer acquisition to customer aversion. As Deepinder noted “we should be concerned”, is growth at all costs good for the company and the user?