Session It’s a case of good news and bad news for digital marketers right now. The bad news is that third-party cookies are being phased out by 2022 – and however hard one begs, they’re not coming back.
The good news, however, is that necessity is often the mother of invention – and if brands are smart, they are already thinking of how to deliver the hyper-personalised experiences their customers require.
But it is never as easy as all that.
There is an argument to be made that a marketer is only as good as the data at their disposal. “First-party data is the ultimate lifeline – possibly even the holy grail – for the future of marketing in a cookieless world,” wrote Kumar Doshi, SVP marketing at Lucid, in this publication earlier this month.
It is a long haul to get there, Doshi notes, but being analytical and authentic in the capture and finessing of this data is key. “Incorporating behavioural analysis within a marketing strategy allows marketers to actively observe how consumers interact with their brands,” he wrote. “Ultimately, this will prove crucial to increasing campaign efficiency. Owning the opportunity to build out consumer behavioural data sets can be an effective way to align with target markets.”
On the authenticity side, the case was even clearer. “The consumer should always be top of mind, and top priority, when building and executing a marketing strategy,” wrote Doshi. “Marketers must leverage their first-party data and other actionable consumer insights to create authentic messaging that they know will resonate with their intended audience, because they’ve done their homework.
“They’ve tapped into those shifting consumer sentiments, they understand what’s most important to their target customer, and they’re adjusting their messaging and tactics accordingly.”
This will assuage those who are worried about what they will do in a cookieless landscape. But how to do it? It is all about delivering the right data-driven culture.
The first thing to remember is that ‘one size fits all’ does not work. As Kevin Virsolvy of Brandwatch pointed out in an interview with this publication in October: “It is astonishing how many times I have personally heard the saying ‘if it works here, it will work everywhere.’
“Set your goals and decide your use case,” Virsolvy added. “That will help you determine the data sources and the solution you’ll need to get there.”
Brandwatch’s capability in social listening was a key factor in its acquisition by Cision in February in a blockbuster martech deal. The move, the companies said, was ‘category-defining’ and ‘brought PR, social media management and digital consumer intelligence together.’
One company already in Cision’s stable is Falcon.io, a social media marketing platform. The thinking, as Ulrik Bo Larsen, founder and CEO, noted, was around integration across all areas. “Together, Cision and Brandwatch offer a compelling combination and – coupled with Falcon’s social media management platform – we are well poised to provide brands with consumer and media intelligence to devise more effective customer engagement strategies from marketing and PR to research and product development,” wrote Larson.
The world may look scary once third-party cookies disappear if you’re a marketer – but Brandwatch and Falcon.io are making it their mission to guide brands through the rough seas.
At DMWF Global, a virtual event taking place on June 2-3, Mercedes Lois Bull, product marketing manager at Brandwatch, and Wiebke Leffers, customer strategist at Falcon.io, will explore how to build a competitive social strategy through a data-driven culture.
This session at DMWF Global outlines:
- How to benefit from digital consumer insights to form your strategy
- How to create personalized marketing campaigns that resonate with your audience
- How to build a data-driven culture
Register for your place at DMWF Global here.
Interested in hearing leading global brands discuss subjects like this in person?
Find out more about Digital Marketing World Forum (#DMWF) Europe, London, North America, and Singapore.
Thank you for this amazing article
a step in the right direction for privacy, but going to be tough to deliver a tailored experience