Eyes On The Future: Marketing in a Cookieless World

Cookies are disappearing in 2024. Not the delicious kind, the third-party computer kind that helps computers improve your web browsing experience.

Late-2024 seems like a while away but now is the time you need to start focusing on a first-party data strategy.

Worried about a cookieless world?

If you are worried don't worry because you are In good company. “Nearly two thirds (64%) of media owners and publishers are worried about the impact of a cookieless world. And nearly half (48%) of marketers worry that their companies won’t be able to provide impactful performance without cookies.”(1)

So the big question is what are you doing as a brand to create first party data? 
One great place to start is your social media channels because there is no guarantee that they are going to stick around forever. Remember that guy that you high-fived with the huge following on MySpace or Vine? Remember that guy that built up a huge social media following and then got suspended and lost his millions of followers? Reality is that tomorrow is not guaranteed to be there for any social media channel or account. 

So what should your plan be?

It should be to start amplifying your engagement strategy and driving social media followers to microsites to share their information with you so you have their email, etc. Start creating multiple touch points because over time some of them might disappear. Email likely will always be top dog.

Don’t believe us?

How about Willem Blom, Partner and Global SVP of Performance, Media and Data, Dept at Adweek who wrote, “It’s how marketers collect and use first-party data that is the new arms race. Instead of focusing on what we will lose, we should be focusing on building the next evolution of digital media experiences.”(2)

What experiences are you building?
Brands are going to have to take responsibility for generating their own first party data starting now, waiting until 2024 will be too late. 

Without a first-party data strategy, how will you continue to build your list? One way to do this at scale is to automate it across your social platforms. 

“The future of targeting will rely on audiences created using alternatives that avoid cookies altogether. Time-based targeting and event-based targeting of syndicated and custom audiences which have been created using fully permissioned audiences curated from organic engagement.” (1)