Proposed data privacy law would hurt small businesses
This commentary is by Elizabeth Raley, the owner of and primary photographer for Elope to Savannah.
When I graduated from the Savannah College of Art and Design more than 20 years ago, I just couldn’t say goodbye to enchanting Savannah. I wanted to combine my love of the city with my desire to be an artist, so I started a business shooting portraits and weddings in Savannah’s many picturesque locales.
But as many a bride or groom knows, big weddings are often incredibly stressful — and I saw that the pressure of orchestrating a flawless event often overshadowed the real meaning of a couple’s wedding day. So I was thrilled when, in 2013, a dear friend gave me the opportunity to take over his elopementplanning business. Since then, I’ve worked incredibly hard to make the business my own, and to turn it into the finely tuned elopement-coordination and photography operation it is today. Over the past 11 years, I and my small team of specialists have planned and officiated more than 4,000 intimate, stress-free and wonderfully relaxed Savannah weddings.
But how does a niche business like mine find customers? Answer: old-fashioned word-of-mouth recommendations, and, critically, modern data-powered digital ads. That’s why I’m concerned about a bill called the American Privacy Rights Act (APRA). APRA would tightly regulate the data that makes digital ads so helpful, which means it could really hurt the business I’ve nurtured for more than a decade.
My tiny enterprise is only relevant to a sliver of the population. I can’t afford to run TV or radio ads, and that kind of mass advertising would be an incredibly ineffective way to find customers for my specialty service. Fortunately — and amazingly — digital partners such as Google and Facebook can use light-speed technology to analyze giant pools of data and ensure I send the right ads to the right audience. That lets me attract the most elopers for the fewest ad dollars, which means my team and I can spend our time and money ensuring we give couples the best possible wedding experience.
Some lawmakers say APRA only impacts big companies, but that’s not the case. My business is well below the bill’s 200,000-annual-data-points compliance threshold, but APRA will still seriously impact us, and thousands of other small businesses, in a number of ways.
Here’s why. APRA says covered businesses can only use customers’ data to provide a specific product or service. I understand that lawmakers’ aim is to prevent data brokers from collecting people’s personal data and selling it without their knowledge. The problem is that APRA would also apply to my business’s larger digital partners, who collect and process data to provide services that are vital to our success. That includes things such as personalized ads and marketing emails, as well as insights into what states or regions customers typically come from, which ads work best, and what keywords customers use to find us.
If our partners can no longer provide us with these data-powered services and insights, it will be much harder to reach and understand our customer base. That will make it harder and more expensive to find new customers — and harder to keep our business growing and thriving.
APRA also contains a “private right of action,” which means anyone could sue us alleging noncompliance with the law, and force us to prove that the business doesn’t meet the 200,000-data-points compliance threshold. Unfortunately, recent history shows that private right of action is an open invitation for unscrupulous lawyers looking to extract settlement fees from helpless small businesses.
Data-powered insights and digital ads allow thousands of small, niche businesses like mine to grow, thrive and compete with much bigger players. I understand and appreciate legislators’ desire to protect Americans’ sensitive data. But I ask legislators to try to understand and appreciate small businesses’ point of view, too. Surely Congress can craft a privacy law that protects people’s sensitive information and allows quirky little businesses like mine to succeed.
Elizabeth Raley Guest columnist