Marketers are in for a rough patch. Consider a gloomy world in which website users hide in the shadows and advertisers rely solely on their wits to determine who sees their digital ads. This, we’re assured, is the cookie-free future, and it’s just around the corner.
The letter ‘C’ can cause this type of anxiety. Until recently, it was difficult to fathom how the industry could withstand such a paradigm shift. Cookies enable us to target our adverts, understand what visitors do on our websites, and assess our success. What’s the harm in doing so?
Many people are concerned about who has access to their online data as a result of recent hazy attempts to map and manipulate them using their data. The introduction of GDPR provided much-needed clarity on how data consent should be obtained, as well as greatly increased public awareness of data protection problems. As a result, we’ve become well-trained to un-tick the relevant boxes when that unpleasant box appears on the screen.
Platform operators have been quick to react to a shift in public sentiment toward data sovereignty and the fear of users abandoning ship. Apple was the first to implement changes this year, and others have since followed suit, with Google pledging to phase away cookies by 2024.
This is a source of consternation for digital advertising and, well, everyone who operates a website. Unsatisfied advertisers are terrible for big tech’s bottom line.
Users’ previous consent benefits login-based services such as Facebook and Amazon. They haven’t, however, avoided messy cookie warnings. Meta predicted a $10 billion drop in ad income as a result of Apple’s new data privacy rules this year.