How much is our data worth ?

 

Now that is an interesting question is it?
For the average person is no longer so but if you are reading this it is a safe bet you are already wondering so. Like any of the deepest questions in  our world, this topic needs context to be correctly analyzed so let's begin:

What is "data"?

Data is a very volatile concept which is easily shaken by the social media companies and government, basically it is any information they can take from you and compile.
It doesn't sound so vile right? But start taking in account how much of your life they are disclosing either directly or indirectly and it will amaze you.
A big part of their information gathering starts with your name, age, address ,etc. this will constitute your profile, which will serve as a header for the next steps which will be:

• who are your friends
• where do you go to eat
• what do you like
• what do you hate
• Which ideas do you support
• what do you buy

To name a few.
Still doesn't sounds ominous? Let's continue:
This profile will classify you into different categories easily searchable and catalogued which will be used for diverse purposes

So let's get in context: in the old days if a business wanted to advertise on their products they would buy space in the radio or in a TV spot where most people are watching and hope for the best.

That is until demographics came into the scene.

Then people started studying who watched what and when and the market started changing.

Let's take the example of the TV show "Matlock".

"Matlock" was a TV series about a senior citizen who was an amazing detective and every week he would solve a mystery, most of the time related to other senior citizens.

Now it would be a show which would attract senior citizens mostly right?, well it did but it also attracted people who were interested in mystery and investigation series.
So a company selling products and services for senior citizens would buy time for their ads at "Matlock" and hope for the best.

But how about if you could filter out people not interested in your product and filter in people interested in whichever age band there is?
Enter social media, now companies did this using questionnaires at malls and supermarkets, nowadays they don't need to do so, we do it for them.
Filling out your profile for your friends to see also do so for the company to fill out the blanks, they allow political movements to join in and use their platform to organize, just so they can get a list of who joins what, even your shopping and wish list is shared so they know what do you want and they can sell ads to the companies who want to sell it to you.

But how much is all this worth?

In online marketing there is no way to actually control who has "seen" your advertising so the way they charge for it is for the people who actually clicked on your ad (cost per click or CPC)
Just the service of focused advertising makes Facebook ads worth between $0.50 to $4 a click (which would mean it got the interest of one person)

Average Facebook CPC & Other Benchmarks by Industry in 2019

Industry	Avg. CPC	Avg. Click-through Rate	Avg. Conversion Rate
Apparel	$0.45	1.24%	4.11%
Automotive	$2.24	0.80%	5.11%
B2B	$2.52	0.78%	10.63%
Beauty	$1.81	1.16%	7.1%
Consumer Services	$3.08	0.62%	9.96%
Education	$1.06	0.73%	13.58%
Employment & Job Training	$2.72	0.47%	11.73%
Finance & Insurance	$3.77	0.56%	9.09%
FItness	$1.90	1.01%	14.29%
Home Improvement	$2.93	0.70%	6.56%
Healthcare	$1.32	0.83%	11%
Industrial Services	$2.14	0.71%	0.71%
Legal	$1.32	1.61%	5.6%
Real Estate	$1.81	0.99%	10.68%
Retail	$0.7	1.59%	3.26%
Technology	$1.27	1.04%	2.31%
Travel & Hospitality	$0.63	0.90%	2.82%

(Source: WordStream)

An average Ad campaign for a small company would mean at least $10.000 a month and the best part, it is for each company so the information is sold once and again and again and again....
Facebook has made more than $1 billion per quarter just from ads alone which certainly tell us more from the financial value of our data than any other points of worth, but there is more....

Political Value
Cambridge Analytica,  currently a bad word in the commercial world, but not so a few years ago it was one of the most successful advisors in regards of... political campaigning using focused advertising.

Countries where SCL Elections claims to have worked
US
UK
Argentina
Colombia
Guyana
Uruguay
Trinidad and Tobago
Grenada
St Vincent and the Grenadines
Saint Lucia
St Kitts & Nevis
Antigua and Barbuda
Cyprus
Nigeria
Gabon
Kenya
Zambia
South Africa
Latvia
Lithuania
Ukraine
Romania
Italy
Moldova
Albania
India
Pakistan
Nepal
Thailand
Indonesia
Philippines
Mauritius

The financial gain in politics is enormous and as per their results the ammount of data they brought in from our social networks did paid its due.
So as far as getting paid for your data it might be worth around $100 - $200 but as companies go each person data can be monetized for million

Reference
https://www.adweek.com/digital/facebook-lookalike-audiences-help-advertisers-reach-users-similar-to-current-customers-others-in-their-database/
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/427941/the-biggest-cost-of-facebooks-growth/
https://adespresso.com/pricing/
https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2019/07/14/facebook-twitter-how-much-data-worth/39677311/
https://www.aljazeera.com/ajimpact/data-worth-bill-google-190624204901419.html
http://stenor.github.io/
https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/carlos-de-torres-gimeno/big-data_b_4817705.html
https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/where-do-marketers-get-leads-data
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/03/how-much-is-your-data-worth-mmm-somewhere-between-half-a-cent-and-1-200/254730/
https://medium.com/wibson/how-much-is-your-data-worth-at-least-240-per-year-likely-much-more-984e250c2ffa
https://fee.org/articles/how-much-is-your-data-worth-to-tech-companies-lawmakers-want-to-tell-you-but-they-have-no-idea/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/stephanzoder/2019/08/06/how-much-is-your-data-worth
https://fitsmallbusiness.com/how-much-does-facebook-advertising-cost/