Is Google making biscuits now?

My wife surprised me the other day when she asked, “Is Google making biscuits now”? Her question left me nonplussed. Google and biscuits? Though I’ve been involved with digital marketing for some time now, I was clueless about what she was referring to. Since her tone suggested genuine curiosity I gently probed and very soon learnt the real reason of her consternation. In these WFH times, she happened to overhear during one of my work calls a mention of Google’s decision to do away with third-party ‘cookies’. Given how widespread Google’s sphere of influence already is in all our lives, she was quick to connect the dots and see it as a possible new brand extension by the ubiquitous tech behemoth in the FMCG space. So I hastily clarified that Google had not declared any intent to market biscuits or any other bakery items so far and the cookie reference was only alluding to a tracking code placed on its browser by the websites. 

While the better half’s concerns were allayed successfully, her query stayed in my head for a while and then triggered memories of another similar conversation that took place in the neighbourhood recently. I had bumped into my 68-year old ‘socially-aware’ elderly neighbour during one of the morning walks and he had asked, “Is this true what they are saying on Netflix”? Again, I had no idea about what he was referring to. Some clarifications later, I understood the context. Recently, Netflix had aired a documentary called Social Dilemma which dealt with the behind-the-scenes goings-on of digital channels and how all users have their identities ‘sold’ to advertisers behind their backs. Knowing that my work domain overlapped with the subject, he thought it fit to get an insider’s views. My comments in response were needless to say, quite ambiguous and suitably vague and I’m pretty sure left him more confused than he was earlier. 

Nevertheless, both these chats brought home the underlying common theme quite starkly. My wife and my elderly neighbour are both digital newbies and like most laypeople using the internet these days, they too have no deep understanding of tech operations taking place at the back end of online companies like Google and Facebook etc. While they’re happy using the free offerings of these big entities e.g. Google Search and Facebook or Instagram’s social apps, their worries represent the concerns of a wide majority of digital users who are increasingly getting alarmed about privacy matters. The discovery that their user profiles are actually the product on the basis of which these internet companies are plying their trade, seems to be increasingly shaking up a huge number of commoners. Plus, there’s also been other controversies like Cambridge Analytica in recent times that has brought the discussion around digital identities and privacy into sharper focus. 

So what really are the facts around digital identity and privacy now? How‘naked’ are we in front of these digital companies and their advertiser clients? And are the ‘culprits’ doing anything to alleviate the concerns of common folks? 

For this, we will have to start with cookies again 

The one big element lying at the heart of these privacy-related discussions is the cookie. The cookie, as most advertising practitioners would know, stores data related to the user’s interaction with the website, such as items added to cart, login data, form data, etc. However, unlike first-party cookies that allow web site owners to personalise their offerings for users, third-party cookies are created by external content providers such as advertisers, digital marketers and content discovery platforms. These give access to user data and activity related to one website with other parties. And third-party cookies and trackers are also the basis for how ads target users based on their preferences and web browsing activity. 

Now, marketers, media planners & advertisers have relied on third-party cookies for years to control the way their ads are delivered with relevant messages to the desired user (consumer) groups. Most cross-device and cross-platform advertising is made possible by these third party cookies, for instance. 

But things are going to change soon 

Google’s Chrome, the overwhelming market leader among browsers, is undergoing a transformation around cookies. Google recently announced plans to phase out third-party cookies in Chrome. The move is an update of Google’s initiative announced in August 2019, called the Privacy Sandbox, to develop a set of open standards to enhance privacy on the web. Rival browsers like Mozilla Org’s Firefox or Apple’s Safari have already been implementing anti-tracking measures. The challenge for publishers in the adtech world is to find a ‘legal’ way of processing personal data amid a host of new regulations such as GDPR. With India passing the Personal Data Protection Bill, there are local regulatory challenges as well. 

While Google has claimed the move will protect user privacy, martech and adtech firms worry about the long-term impact on revenue. Will things change dramatically? Would the entire framework of advertising-funded digital monetisation be upended with this shift? 

It’s quite likely that the fading away of the 3rd party cookies would lead to problems in Personalization, Behavioural Targeting, Frequency Capping & Retargeting. Without the help of cookies, advertisers may also have a tough time extracting information about relevant look-alike audiences. Since third-party cookies are also used to measure impressions, views, clicks, page visits, etc. advertisers worry that without them, they may not be able to identify the channel or touchpoint that must be credited for the conversion. 

Newer ways of targeting? 

As the role of cookies in online marketing reduces gradually, marketers are looking to find alternatives that can help trace digital fingerprints across devices, operating systems, browsers and IP addresses. 

Ad providers have resorted to more opaque profiling techniques such as fingerprinting. In this technique, ad providers get access to distinct information that can vary between users, such as what device they have or what fonts they have installed and more to generate unique identifiers that can then be used to track the user across websites. While cookies could be cleared by a user, fingerprints cannot be cleared by users, leaving them without a choice to reset. 

One other big development is around the use of first-party cookies and login-based profiling and a combination of them. Clients are being advised to prioritise the use of first-party data as much as possible: it’s your own data and safe. (Second-party also is relatively fine since it’s normally acquired or borrowed in barter exchange and therefore carries no real risk of contamination from a trusted partner) 

Companies are also looking for solutions to get enough information about users even without cookies, using customer data platforms (CDP).A CDP provides a unified view of the customer's data, which it receives from various sources. It gives advertisers a 360-degree view of the customer's profile to understand their behaviour and personalize the experience for them across all channels. 

Outside of all that, if like in today’s times, marketers want to reach out to a large internet using population what’s going to be the recourse? Is the absence of third-party cookies going to render micro marketing claims of digital media meaningless? Not really. 

Large publishers have already been developing their own walled gardens to provide authenticated data to advertising (a-la Google, FB, Amazon, TripAdvisor, Jio etc) through private marketplace (PMP) advertising. Going forward, users will have to use their email IDs to log in to the publisher's website to access high-quality content. Based on the content the user engages with, the publisher can connect the data points, which advertisers can use to show relevant ads. Advertisers can also leverage identity resolution tools to transform consumer data into person-based identifiers, which can then be used to create personalized ads for customers across the various stages of the customer's journey. 

DMPs like Lotame and Programmatic leaders like TheTradeDesk (TTD)are also developing newer technologies to circumvent the problem. The latter’s Unified ID 2.0 initiative, for instance, appears promising. TTD is building on the work of the IAB Tech Lab and developing an open-source ID framework. Built from hashed and encrypted email addresses, this ID will remain open while introducing upgrades to consumer privacy and transparency. 

Bottom line: will death of cookies also kill digital marketing? 

Majority of digital marketers believe that the end of third-party cookies could eventually increase the power of dominant players like Google in the digital ad industry.It’s in Google’s interest to accelerate the phase-out as the decline of cookies is good for the walled gardens that Google has created for its own ad network.In other words, Google will have access to all first-party data and third-party advertisers will need to get on Google’s ad network to receive the data that will help them target the right users. (Differently put, Larry Page and Sergey Brin are going to do everything they can to avoid coming under the glare of privacy scrutiny but still ensure that their gravy train doesn’t get derailed). 

So bottom line? Things will change for sure. Yet, they might not.

And no, don’t expect Google to start making biscuits anytime soon.

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are solely those of the author and do not in any way represent the views of exchange4media.com.