Privacy vs Personalization: The Battle Over Tracking Cookies
Being a consumer and a marketer simultaneously is very strange. On the one hand, you feel all the annoyances that a consumer feels about persistent ads and data privacy; on the other hand, as a marketer, you understand the necessity.
So with the announcement of the end of tracking cookies, Apple’s new privacy and security features, and more privacy regulations being passed, I was conflicted if I should be happy as a consumer, or if should be worried as a marketer.
Let’s take a look at the positive and negative aspects of these changes for both consumers and marketers.
From a CONSUMER’S point of view:
The Good
1. Increased privacy — Perhaps the biggest benefit that a consumer will get out of the end of tracking cookies is having the ability to have more control over their personal data and online behavior, thus increasing their privacy. Brands will no longer be able to collect data on consumers’ browsing history and behavior.
2. Less targeted ads — Personalized ads are great and effective to a certain extent. However, a lot of ads these days have become intrusive and annoying more than anything. Without tacking cookies, consumers can expect to see fewer personalized ads allowing their digital experience to have less clutter and unwanted noise.
3. Less data collection — Consumers can also benefit from the end of tracking cookies as this will result in the reduced risk of data breaches and identity theft since less data will be collected from them.
The Bad
1. Less personalized experience — Consumers might need to manually input their preferences and settings each time they visit a website without tracking cookies because publishers won’t be able to effectively customize each user’s experience anymore.
2. Less relevant ads — Without the help of tracking cookies, brands will not be able to target their ads as well as they used to. This can result in frustration among consumers as they might see more irrelevant ads they are not interested in.
3. Increased paywalls — Publishers might expect a decrease in revenue along with a decrease in personalized ads as these tend to have a higher click-through rate, making personalized ads valuable to publishers. To make up for lost revenue, there is a chance that they will implement more paywalls resulting in either limited access to content for consumers or having to pay extra for access.
From a MARKETER’S point of view:
The Good
1. Increased trust — 73% of consumers are willing to share their data if companies were more transparent about how it was being used. With the end of tracking cookies and the increase in transparency of data collection practices, marketers can benefit from this as it may help them build the trust of their consumers.
2. New solutions — For marketers, the end of tracking cookies presents an exciting opportunity as they will have to come up with new strategies for reaching consumers with relevant ads. They will have to come up with advertising strategies that don’t depend on cookies alone.
3. Better data — Marketers will be compelled to turn to first-party data as a replacement since tracking cookies will no longer be an available data source. Since they are gathered from users directly, they tend to be more accurate and reliable. Marketers may also use social media to learn more about consumer behavior and interests or use more complex data-gathering techniques like machine learning and artificial intelligence. These might result in better targeting and conversion rates.
The Bad
1. Less data — Marketers will have limited access to users’ browsing histories, search inquiries, and other online activities without the help of tracking cookies. It will be more difficult for marketers to paint a comprehensive image of who their customers are.
2. Reduced targeting — One of the biggest disadvantages of the end of tracking cookies for marketers is that their ability to target consumers and tailor ads to their specific needs and preferences will be lessened, which might result in them having to rely on broader targeting techniques for now.
3. Disruption — The loss of tracking cookies is a difficult transition that marketers will need to go through. This will require a significant amount of investment in new technologies and the research and development of new solutions to take the place of tracking cookies.
Privacy vs Personalization: The Verdict
I have come to the conclusion that I fully support the end of tracking cookies. As a consumer, I have serious concerns about the safety and privacy of my data and the end of tracking cookies allows me to feel safer and trust brands more. As a marketer, I see this as an opportunity to innovate and find better ways to do our work that will make both brands and consumers equally happy.
Third-party cookies are innately problematic, and putting an end to them will force marketers to come up with better solutions. As the world constantly evolves and adapts, I believe this challenge will ultimately lead to marketing and user privacy improvements.
How do you feel about the end of tracking cookies? I would love to hear about it below!
Thank you for reading this week’s blog, and I’ll see you in the next one.
