A cookieless world, not really cookieless!
The writing was on the cards, a long time ago.
3rd Party Cookies gone.
The AdTech and MarTech industry has been talking about this for years, we knew this day was coming, we delayed, we procrastinated, we thought just one more month, quarter or year, but the day is now rapidly approaching and what does it look like?
The fact that 3rd Party cookies are already partially obsolete within part of the AdTech ecosystem with Safari Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP) and, Firefox just means that Google’s Chrome is late to the party. Perhaps Google has delayed this to be able to fully leverage this change?
What is a 3rd Party Cookie, did the web visitor want that?
Some of you reading this may ask what is the importance and how does this really affect online marketing? If we look at the ecosystem and break down what 3rd Party cookies actually are we can start to draw a picture of why targeting by cookies has long needed an overhaul. A 3rd Party cookie is a cookie that is dropped onto a users device when that user visits a web page.
Why is it a 3rd Party cookie? If you visit CompanyX.com and when hitting that web page a sponsored piece of text, image or ad appears, that content is served from CompanyY.com and is from a different web server to Company X. The Cookie dropped from Company Y is a 3rd party cookie as it is from another domain. The cookie dropped from Company X will be considered a 1st Party cookie and that process isn’t changing.
“First-party cookies are stored by the domain (website) you are visiting directly. They allow website owners to collect analytics data, remember language settings, login details and perform other useful functions that help provide a good user experience.
Third-party cookies are created by domains other than the one you are visiting directly, hence the name third-party. They are used for cross-site tracking, retargeting and ad-serving.”
As a consumer visiting Company X did you really want Company Y to track you also?
Let’s face it, the 3rd Party cookie ecosystem has become vast. It is over traded, poor in quality and poor for performance. 3rd Party Cookies have been traded by multiple data providers, DMP-DSP’s, all claiming to be unique, it’s no wonder ROI and value was slowly eroding when brands were using multiple activation partners for the same streams of online activity with everyone claiming a unique audience.
So Cookies are still important?
So interestingly when we talk about a cookieless world, we are not really actually going to be cookieless we are moving towards a clearer, cleaner marketplace. In reality, users must be pleased that instead of having hundreds of cookies dropped when visiting a site, they, in fact, should only opt-in to the cookie from the destination they are visiting, right? Potentially a simplistic view but one I feel has legs, both from a privacy point but also for usability.
The 1st Party world. Right message, right device, the right moment in time.
Fast forward to a world where publishers and advertisers are working hard to unlock and develop their own first-party audience. Audiences with opt-in metrics like name, address, email, phone number and then layered with enhanced information about behaviour, interests and purchasing history, for example. We can move closer towards an environment where advertising and communications engage, are more relevant and offer incremental value.
Cookie targeting is an area that hasn’t seen change in a long time in an industry that traditionally sees changes at dramatic speeds.
What we are seeing now is something quite exciting, the rise of multiple walled gardens, ecosystems of 1st Party data pools, brands working hard to build their own 1st Party datasets, publishers working hard to build a more robust, richer, more insightful audience understanding.
In some ways the need for marketers to understand the nuances of the technical aspect is potentially not important, understanding what the new strategy is, is fundamental, and the new strategy is about creating a value exchange to let consumers feel comfortable about sharing data so that as a marketer you can deliver the right message, on the right device, at the right moment in time.
The control of 65.47% (Chrome Browser Market Share June 2020) Browser stats StatCounter
The Privacy Sandbox (Turtle-Dov) is not just about 3rd Party Cookies
Of course, we are seeing Google introducing their privacy sandbox initiative Turtle-Dov on top of the announcement that 3rd Party cookies will no longer be supported in chrome, a move that has in some circles caused alarm.
I watched a webinar recently where the sentiment was more of concern that this is a land grab by Google rather than a privacy initiative, along with 3rd Party cookie removal, Google will also look to rescind other key attributes on analytics tracking. The webinar covered a vast array of topics, but the part I found most interesting and what resonated with me was a section from Stephanie Layser, Vice President, Advertising Technology & Operations at News Corp at about 44 mins into the webinar from 51 Degrees:
YouTube Transcript snipits.
“you know something that matt touched on before, about google having this vast treasure trove of user data”
“over the course of the last 10 to 15 years is companies like Google and Facebook have been collecting our data aggregating it at scale and using it for their own insights”
“they've essentially been stealing publishers data repackaging it and saying ah that's google data”
This was so onpoint as a statement, but this argument is exactly the same for the consumer’s data that companies hold on them. I talked in a previous post about the value of data and we are now in a world where the value exchange between platforms, publishers, consumers and advertisers has changed. 15 years ago Google Analytics a free web analytics tool (launched November 2005), was great, the benefits to sites using it was immense but the power of balance and value has shifted as the industry has exponentially grown and now the value exchange isn’t perceived as equal.
Turtle-Dov also represents a further restriction on data shared with site owners like behaviour and user information that remains unclear and there is concern that Google will have more data decisioning power than ever locked under the hood.
Micro “Walled” gardens, privacy, opt-in data.
So to the rise of identity matching solutions, the growth of a move towards micro walled gardens, individual publisher networks that now strive to grow their first-party data sets, brands who continue to evolve their own first-party data to ultimately unlock 1:1 targeting. Companies like ZeoTap, Infosum, Permutive, ID5 are going to see huge growth in an unstable, undefined market place as the story continues to unfold. Will the privacy initiative continue to grow and see these industries have to pivot continually? How GAFA responds may determine the nature of where it goes.
Matching of compliant opt-in data through custom audiences has been around for a while with Facebook, Amazon and Google, not 1:1 but cohort audiences. Perhaps the rise of 1:1 opt-in data matching through combining 1st Party sets presents the most advanced personalised experience ever, will it scale, will there be the volume for the market?
Exciting, uncertain times.
All in all an exciting period of change is underway, not defined, certainly not mapped out, but exciting. Will identity graph mapping succeed, will the continued use of digital finger-printing continue to evolve and skirt the lines of privacy initiatives, will micro walled gardens become the norm or will GAFA (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon) ultimately continue to reign and gain even more power as they continue to lock down the ecosystem?
Want to talk more about the cookieless debate drop me a line, Oliver
