There is no denying that putting the customer at the heart of your operations will allow you to be more narrowed in on the things that matter most; allowing you to build better products and services to attract and retain a healthy base of customers. But ever since the advent of the 3rd party cookie, there has been an even greater obsession amongst marketers to know exactly who these end customers are.
The obsession makes sense.
By knowing who these customers are, you can better target, communicate and retain them; allowing your dollar to go further. And by knowing all the touchpoints they interact with across their online journey and applying data-driven algorithms, you can understand which touchpoints are most valuable and give the greatest return. You can now spend more time fishing where the fish are.
There is no denying the value this can bring. But is this stalker-like relationship with your end customer necessary to know them? Is there a less invasive way to anonymously track and categorize behavioral patterns online to pick up on psychographic segments? Do you really need to know a person’s demographics down to their A/S/L?
Even if you find yourself amongst the core believers that deem this depth of detail ‘required,’ new data policy might be forcing you to change your perspective.
Enter ‘sunsetting cookies’ – the slow death of 3rd party cookies.
You’ve heard of this cookie term... But really what do cookies do?
In short, a ‘cookie’ is a data layer that is either installed by the website serving the page (1st party cookie) or by a third party (3rd party cookie). This cookie lives on a user’s browser and can pick up every interaction they have across their online journey. It can collect enough personal information that even when a user is on another browser, it can infer it is the same person.
The branding of this data layer as ‘cookies’ was genius. Unintentionally or not, it created a mental link to something widely loved and harmless (my waistline might argue otherwise); allowing many to be carelessly distracted from the fact that they were enabling a technology to stalk them from behind the scenes.
But many couldn’t be fooled for long and there has been broader industry and regulatory pressure to prioritize user privacy. Privacy laws going forward will eliminate the third-party cookie and prevent sharing data of any kind with a third party without the permission from the user. As a result, 1st parties will be the only ones sitting on the treasure chest of user data. This policy change has been met with fear and backlash; skeptics believe the internet will be less open, will require more authentication, and as a result, will inhibit marketers’ ability to really target and find their customers.
This has negative implications for customers, not only in creating more friction in their user experience, but also in missing out on new products, or exciting offers. It also will have an impact for the corporations hoping to reach them. This takes form in lost sales opportunities and inefficient advertising… the recipe for every shareholder’s worst nightmare… shrinking profits and a weak bottom line.
But fear not, Google comes to the(ir) rescue with the Google Privacy Sandbox! Their MVP for a substitutable, privacy safe way for marketers to track and advertise to customers.
Well eventually… You might be aware that this new solution was meant to come to market in 2024. But alas, they’ve kicked the can (cookie jar?), down the road until the end of 2025. This delay may indicate that Google is quite far out from a viable solution that will sufficiently replace the 3rd cookie.
More on our take of the Google Privacy Sandbox coming soon!
