Sometimes change is a good thing.
That sentiment is certainly true with Google’s decision to halt their use of third-party cookies by the end of 2021.
But with change usually comes with some questions and concerns. In this case, a lot of marketers immediately thought: “How the heck are we going to target and segment our ad audiences without cookies?” It’s a valid question, as second and third-party cookies were responsible for many audience segmentation parameters up until now. But there’s good news here: we’re moving into a world of digital advertising where targeting will be much more accurate, trustworthy, and personal.
A Cookie-less World Is More Accurate
While the third-party cookies of old did allow for uber-specific audience segmentation (let’s only target people who read about the 2010 movie adaptation of “Mamma Mia!”), it also had a lot of room for discrepancies. Because second and third-party cookies could be gathered and traded around the web in lots of different ways, there’s always been a pretty high chance of inaccuracies. Here, you can even request to take a look at your own cookie data and see what’s accurate and what’s questionable. In a cookie-less world, data is going to be more accurate and reliable, because we’re going to be forced to become very reliant on first-party data (AKA the data we ask for and earn from users). The “middle-man” aspect of data getting traded around the web from publisher to publisher before it lands in our ad platforms is being taken away, which means we’re left with only the most accurate data to target with.
A Cookie-less World Is More Trustworthy
As marketers and advertisers, we probably thought we loved third-party data, right? But as users? Not so much. It’s clear that things got out of control in the past couple of years, with many countries and regions adapting their own privacy regulations around cookie gathering and usage (think: GDPR, CCPA, LGPA) due to push-back from consumers just like us. And now with Google finally joining the bandwagon of other browsers who are swearing off third-party cookies, web publishers and companies like ours can focus on what really matters: building relationships and earning the data that we want from our users. There won’t be a way to gather data without permission, which is a great thing if we want to kick off relationships with potential customers in a trusting way.
A Cookie-less World Is More Personal
Here’s where we get a little Terminus-y. Thanks to some incredible technologies and processes that we’ve been working on for years, targeted advertising in a cookie-less world looks way more personal. In fact, it’s so personal that we’re allowing Terminus customers to use 1:1 targeting for their digital ads. Imagine the power of building a relationship with a potential customer by targeting them with 1:1 personalized ads. This is made possible by everything we mentioned above–building trust and asking for data in transparent and honest ways, and leveraging the power of first-party data.
In case the “a-ha” moment hasn’t already happened for you, this is literally ABM in action. Personalized ads. Building relationships and trust from first touch. Evolving content and targeting methods as the relationship grows. Smart, targeted, accurate marketing based on relationships and trust. And that’s why we’re so excited to be entering into a cookie-less future, and Terminus is thrilled to be ushering our customers into it, too–with new ad features like Priority Ad Groups and B2B Unified ID.
This is just the beginning of all of the cookie knowledge we want to share with you! Check out our latest eBook “How To Survive In a Post-Cookie World” for a true deep-dive into everything you need to know about the cookie-less future. In it, you’ll find info and advice directly from our resident cookie expert, VP of Advertising Dan Hellerman. He’s sharing:
- A brief history of Cookies
- Where we are today (why Google is getting rid of third-party cookies)
- What this means for digital advertising
- How Terminus is looking forward to a cookie-less future
Check it out below:
