As if there weren’t enough things to distract today’s cell-phone-talking, video-watching, road-rage-shouting drivers, MINI Cooper recently launched an experimental marketing campaign that uses radio frequency identification (RFID) technology to send personalized billboard messages to MINI Cooper drivers. As described in this New York Times piece:

The boards, which usually carry typical advertising, are programmed to identify approaching MINI drivers through a coded signal from a radio chip embedded in their key fob. The messages are personal, based on questionnaires that owners filled out: “Mary, moving at the speed of justice,” if Mary is a lawyer, or “Mike, the special of the day is speed,” if Mike is a chef . . .

Per any true branding campaign, MINI’s billboard messages don’t overtly sell or promote anything, they just make the 1000+ MINI owners in New York, Chicago, Miami, and San Francisco who volunteered for the program look and feel like they’re part of some cool, elite club.

And c’mon, who wouldn’t want to stay in or become a member of such a club? (insert sound of MINIs driving off of new car lots)

Many brands already fuel loyalty with various exclusive perks and “rewards,” but this branding effort takes brand loyalty to a whole new level, building a tribe of hardcore loyalists who don’t just love a brand—they actually get their love publicly requited on a daily basis.

MINI Cooper picks its individual owners out of the crowd and shows everyone else on the road that they are special—very directly making individual owners feel like the cool kids in class. Absolutely brilliant.

But I have to admit, as brilliant as this effort is, there’s something about this kind of hyper-targeting that feels kind of creepy, like the talking billboards in Spielberg’s Minority Report—a bit too “Big Brother.”

Makes me wonder, as technology pushes the potential of marketing efforts, when does personalizing a message build loyalty and when does it turn people off?