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The death of cookies is undoubtedly the privacy revolution in the digital environment. Tools that have restricted the information collected by cookies, such as the Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP) in Safari, the total elimination of third-party cookies in Chrome by 2022 and the iOS14 as the most secure operating system in existence so far, have put the entire digital advertising industry in check.
2022 is the year that Google Chrome will eliminate third-party cookies worldwide, an act that Safari and Firefox have already done. With these three browsers, we already cover almost 100% of the most used browsers in Chile and Latin America. But what are third-party cookies? They are those that allow us to know information about users such as their behavior on the web or their interests, in addition to the personalization of advertisements. Basically, we obtain a user profile thanks to them.
Why should this matter to all of us who work in digital marketing? It’s the most common question I’ve been asked when discussing cookies with customers. The problem is that being a subject that carries such a technical background, it becomes complex to understand the scope that this will have in our disciplines. In the first place, I answer simply, “Much of what we do in advertising is based on cookies, which means that what we know will no longer be.”
What if now I go and tell you that the most used tactic to improve website indicators, the famous “remarketing ” (personalized ads to users who previously visited a web page) will no longer exist or, at least, will not exist as we know it? With this, it is enough material to confuse the heads of e-commerce and all of us who advise on this matter.
Well, this implies the saying or cliché that we must be data-driven. We really put it into practice. The question is, if I no longer have the data that helped me decide what message to show to my audiences, then what data do I use? Since the reign of the data of first source comes, that is to say, the own data. If this year, the big brands do not carry out a data collection strategy, a construction of infrastructure behind, they do not do the advertising tests not based on cookies, those that do not explore measurement alternatives to obtain the real results of the efforts of marketing, all of them, will lose competitive advantage, and worse still, they will lose relevance to the end customer.
The good news is that Google, which bases all its greatness on advertising earnings, has prepared for this new paradigm and announced some solutions in this regard, in what it calls the Privacy Sandbox. I’ll be fair, this is not just about Google, but it is the result of collaborations of different expert areas in the digital world. Imagine that this scenario is so different and complex, that it has sat competitors to see solutions together in this regard, and I will tell you a little about two announced alternatives in the midst of others.
FLoC (Federated Cohort Learning) is a clustering algorithm, which allows us to hide the user from the crowd, that is, we do not have a user profile as we had in third-party cookies, but we can see groupings with certain characteristics, which will allow us to understand them and be able to aim to remain relevant. According to the tests carried out, Google ensures that its effectiveness is 95% compared to the already known advertising and based on cookies. Very promising, but still in testing.
On the other hand, FLEDGE, a solution that aims to provide an alternative to what we know today as remarketing. It is a renamed and improved product from the former Turtledove, which is designed to store information about campaign offers and budgets. For now, the API is expected to be available at the end of this year and will allow the data to be hosted on its own trusted server.
These paths, centered on the Google Chrome browser, are alternatives offered by the advertising giant. However, there are other paths, such as cookie authenticators. That is, they transform the user into an id and allow fluid and relevant experiences to be maintained, maintaining privacy.
Well, the invitation is for them to venture to generate tests, to challenge their suppliers, to put the issue on the table that, together, we all learn to walk these new paths.
The one who takes the initiative now, will be the one who, in the following year when everything restarts under a new paradigm, will have the advantage.
