It might make sense to target different political ads to different geographic regions or demographic groups, but that kind of targeting doesn't always pan out. That's according to Martha Patzer, principal of the consultancy 270 Strategies. What type of data is useful to ad-targeters? Information about people's prior Web activity, Patzer says. "Past online behavior was really a better behavior for future behavior than anything else, including where you live or how old you are," she says.

Political campaigns try to serve targeted ads online, but are challenged by cookie deletions, says Tim Cameron, chief digital strategist at NRSC. "Match rates might be 40% on a good day," he says. But, he adds, it's equally important -- if not more important -- to reach the other 60%. "Just because they clear out their cookies doesn't mean they're not voting," he says. In fact, he adds, "the type of people who take the time to clear out their cookies" probably are even more likely to vote.

Political campaigns are spending more on TV advertising this cycle than in 2012, Jon Adams, digital director for the National Republican Senatorial Committee said this morning.

Programmatic media platform might be still in its “wait a minute” period, according to Kevin Rettig, senior manager, of personalization & customer analytics for Accenture, speaking at MediaPost’s “The Reckoning” event.He says for every dollar spent on programmatic there are platform, technology, verification and other costs; you are left with a lot less. Factoring in non-viewable ads, including ad fraud, you have more waste. Rettig says what remains is around 25 cents actually going to media. “That’s probably a bit more negative view,” says Rettig. “Certainly as media auditors, this is something that we see.”Media agencies making many ad-tech investments could …

Even if it's just more relevant ads, are consumers benefiting from the collection of their digital behavior and personal information? Not likely, according to Bob Gellman, a privacy and information policy consultant. "Economists have begun to look at some of these [data tracking and collection] activities, and they're finding that all the benefits go to the companies [doing the tracking and collecting] and the consumers get hardly anything out of this," Gellman told attendees of MediaPost's The Reckoning conference, on Tuesday. It's more likely that most consumers will lose by surrendering their data, Gellman said. Referring to the notion of …