The future of cookies
You probably already know that Google has once again doubled back on cookie deprecation. This time, instead of punting the ball down the field, they've completely called off the game; presumably due to middling results of Privacy Sandbox testing and the billions in media dollars at stake. Despite cookies staying on our plates (for now, at least), and pretty vague details around Apple’s AppTracking Transparency program, the industry persists in developing and testing alternate data management solutions.
I don’t have a position on what the new way should be to track people’s behaviors and purchases because I don’t think we should; regardless of whether the data is personalized or anonymized. Rather than trying to rebuild a broken, predatory and dubiously successful infrastructure, media companies should throw the baby out with the dank bathwater and come up with something new. AND put more Women, People of Color and Queer people in charge of this (more on this point in a bit).
The ethics around consumer data are murky at best, despite some (not enough) regulation and layers of intermediaries verifying its validity. To wit:
After the overturning of Roe v. Wade, data brokers were caught selling people's location data to anti-choice governments and opportunistic would-be bounty hunters (or anyone with $160 a week to spare).
Location-based data is not the only ethical issue in the ad tech ecosystem. Consumer data is also used to deliver highly personalized disinformation. This isn’t just about predatory sales tactics; consumer data has famously been used to spread disinformation and political propaganda, which has disproportionately harmed already marginalized groups of people.
Atop the ethical concerns, the combination of big data and ad tech has become a crutch that’s making marketing dumber; and people far less empathetic. While the current modus operandi for consumer data application might deliver on short term sales goals, it erodes brand affinity when people discover their data is being used without consent or without any benefit to the consumer.
Media plans have become beyond generic thanks to hyper-focus on what data brokers we use and which tech company can use it most efficiently. We’ve stopped learning (and teaching new talent) how to build comms plans using critical thinking and multiple research methodologies.
Atop the growing inability to think critically (thanks to the plug-and-play data/ad tech ecosystem), we have also stopped thinking about our customers as human beings because it’s easier, faster and cheaper to simply combine a few lines of code.
Brands don’t necessarily benefit from the current system as much as short-term business results. People hate being stalked by brands in their social feeds and inboxes. Sure, that 473rd instagram ad might finally get someone to pull the trigger on an item left in their cart, but will it make them seek out more from your brand or recommend the brand to their network?
Image credit Tom Fishburne the marketoonist
Modern commerce lives and dies by ROI and the industry around it revolves around measurability. But is all of this data, applied in its current state, actually making our plans more effective or even that much more cost efficient? Maybe, maybe not. The opacity of the ad tech and big data ecosystems makes it impossible to confirm causality.
So… how might we reimagine the ad tech ecosystem with consumer privacy in mind without sacrificing the performance for which we’re all ultimately on the hook?
I am not saying let’s halt usage of data completely - but rather let’s reimagine its use and its value (and for whom that value manifests). The status quo will continue to benefit those at the top (mostly white, mostly male Silicon Valley and Wall Street executives) and continue to marginalize and threaten everyone else. The expertise and creativity needed to progress toward a tech utopia already exist; risk aversion and commitment to the status quo are what's halted progress,
For example, Timnit Gebru, founder of Black in AI and a co-lead of Google’s Ethical AI team, was ultimately forced out after elevating the risk of Algorithm bias and the environmental impact of LLMs. Had the top brass at Google empowered the Ethical AI group to pursue new solutions instead, we might already have something better than the current privacy sandbox and will-they/wont-they cookies dilemma.
Several companies I’ve worked for and with have had success with Private Marketplaces, targeting people based on content that interests them rather than individualized data points. Another, more important benefit of these PMPs is they were designed to keep ad dollars in the economies of marginalized groups, whose content was being defunded due to draconian negative keyword lists and targeting.
Again, I’m not a luddite or a defeatist. Tech is here to stay and it will be just as powerful if we use it to assist us in scaling up delivery of human insights rather than digitizing humans.
For example - instead of using AI and its massive corpuses of data to plan and optimize your campaigns, use it to implement qualitative research at scale. Once again - for this to work (from a performance and diversity & equity perspective) - it's critical to have a diverse cross section of your target audience leading research & implementation; and statistically significant representation among respondents .
Go old school! There’s also value in flexing the muscles we had before we had access to all the data in the world. Get out into the streets and do ethnographic research. Put a diverse and representative group of influencers, content creators on your advisory boards. They make their living by understanding what their audiences want.
These are just a few potential solutions. Creativity, risk tolerance, diversity (of people and thought) and persistence will enrich our research, insights and avenues to explore. I’d personally bet on higher long term ROI / lifetime customer value with inclusion of a more human approach. which ultimately protects both the brand and the consumer.
Not pursuing new solutions hurts our industry and our audiences and customers.
Pursuing them only hurts our Silicon Valley oligarchs and to that I say, let them eat cake.
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