Google’s Third-Party Cookie Deprecation Is No More: What Does It Mean for Local Digital Advertising?

Collectively there has been a sigh of relief amongst advertisers and media companies selling thirdparty digital advertising If youamp8217ll recall a report from 2021 said broadcasters could lose 21 billion annually without cookiesThat financial loss did not come to fruition but the targeting of digital ads is evolving So what does Googleamp8217s latest move mean for all of usHow Did ThirdParty Cookies Become So Important for Digital AdvertisingIf you look back at the history of thirdparty cookies youamp8217ll learn that their development had nothing to do with advertising Lou Montulli created these scripts to provide convenience to online shoppers If you were on an ecommerce site and placed items in your cart cookies ensured they stayed there if you left and returned laterThe invention created a better user experience Then the advertising industry became aware of how cookies worked and began to use them for monetization Thirdparty cookies allow domains unaffiliated with the website to collect data and track user interactions This data then enables the targeting of programmatic advertising Ideally cookie information translates to people seeing more relevant ads across the websites and apps they visitItamp8217s no coincidence then that when you search or research a topic you start seeing related ads across propertiesMany types of digital ads can be dependent on cookies for targeting They arenamp8217t perfect in how they work For one they count every device you use differently which means thereamp8217s no connection across your entire internet historyThe biggest worry amp8211 and the chief motivation for cookiesamp8217 removal amp8211 have been privacy concerns Other browsers like Safari and Firefox have already blocked these to protect privacy Google as the largest search engine was expecting to join others but failed to find a feasible alternative that would ensure little disruption to the advertising marketGoogle Privacy Sandbox is Googleamp8217s Alternative and Will Remain ActiveThe Google Privacy Sandbox uses APIs application programming interfaces to allow users to protect information while browsing in Chrome Google promoted it to migrate to contextual or interestbased targetingGoogle has stated that the Privacy Sandbox will remain Instead of a complete shift from cookies to the Privacy Sandbox Chrome users will have a choice of whether they want to share their browsing data Itamp8217s an optin model which is what Apple did with app tracking several years agoGoogle noted its ongoing testing with the Privacy Sandbox but its ability to recover ad performance without cookies has not been a complete success Theyamp8217ve struggled with publisher adoptions small sample sizes for testing and other technical issuesHowever plans to move to cookieless advertising have already been in the works for years with the industry preparing for itA World of Cookies and Cookieless AdvertisingThe ad tactics most associated with thirdparty cookies are those served on thirdparty sites How they target depends greatly on the DSP demandside platform used for programmatic bidding Some have more options than others to match an audience based on demographics geography interests or past online behaviors Retargeting is especially cookiedependent but a display ad can use cookies for targeting or contextual optionsSo thereamp8217ll be no major shakeup in traditional cookie advertising but the path toward cookieless and possibly better targeting has several possibilitiesContextual TargetingContextual targeting has been a clear favorite in the cookieless realm An industry report found that 78 of advertisers plan to increase their use of it In this approach the focus is on context Instead of using thirdparty data sets targeting refers to the content of the websites and the audiences they bringFor example those advertising anything related to home improvement would look for websites where these audiences spend time like HGTV or Houzz The ad fits with the amp8220contextamp8221 and is viewed by those who find it relevantAd Tactics That Donamp8217t Use CookiesMany digital ad options have no cookie association including CTVOTT social media ads email marketing and SEM search engine marketing Of these CTV and OTT are the fastestgrowing local digital ad tactics according to BIA Advisory forecasts The ability to reach a specific audience makes streaming advertising attractive It also doesnamp8217t hurt that streaming is continuously luring viewers away from traditional TVFirstParty Data Targeting and Alternative IdentifiersThe urgency to move away from thirdparty cookies also emphasized firstparty data collection Companies can collect customer data in many ways based on interactions and feedback They can also use cookies to track interactions and behaviors It allows for hyperpersonalization and segmentation of a companyamp8217s direct marketing effortsLargerscale firstparty data targeting is also underway with privacycompliant identifiers They use a hashing algorithm that enables publishers to convert their firstparty data into an anonymous and secure identifierOur industry was already forging a path to adopt cookieless advertising The current news doesnamp8217t erase this progress it doesnamp8217t change too much except the time frame We donamp8217t have to rush to be ready and thatamp8217s a good thingDigital advertising accounts for billions of dollars of revenue for local media companies Preserving and growing these dollars can move to being less dependent on cookies but theyamp8217re still there to keep programmatic ads rolling without colossal disruptionAs an industry we should all keep moving toward optimizing targeting to ensure ad campaigns reach the right people and have a positive return for advertisersThis article was written by Beth Osborne who leads content strategy and execution at Marketron Sheamp8217s been a professional writer for over 20 years helping tech and software companies tell inspiring storiesPosted at MediaVillage through the Thought Leadership selfpublishing platformClick the social buttons to share this story with colleagues and friendsThe opinions expressed here are the author39s views and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillageorgMyersBizNet

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Google’s Third-Party Cookie Deprecation Is No More: What Does It Mean for Local Digital Advertising?

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