Hey Smart Marketers!
Google announced the end of 3rd-party cookies for 2024.
While some hope it will be postponed again, I think this time we should really get prepared.
I read a lot of things the past couple of years about what brands should do.
I can sum it up in one sentence: “The end of 3rd-party cookies means relying on first-party data… therefore you need a CDP”.
However, in 2023, I believe Social Media channels are a better way out and simple targeting in Salesforce Marketing Cloud can do the job: Marketing Cloud Advertising (ex-Advertising Studio) may be your weapon of choice.
#1 Understanding the impact of Third-Party Cookies End of Life
Third-party cookies have traditionally been used in advertising to track customer behavior across the web and deliver personalized ads accordingly. With the end of third-party cookies, advertisers will lose the ability to track customers across different websites and platforms, making it harder to target ads effectively.
This loss of tracking capabilities will impact customer acquisition efforts, as advertisers will have to rely more heavily on first-party data to identify and target customers. While first-party data is more reliable, it is also more limited in scope and may not provide the same level of insights that third-party data can.
A CDP can help to unify customer data from various sources and create a more complete view of the customer, but it does not provide the same level of targeting capabilities as third-party cookies. As a result, marketers will need to find new ways to leverage first-party data to target ads effectively and drive revenue.
#2 Why Social Media Platforms are Good Channels for Advertising Using First-Party Data
Social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter offer an excellent channel for advertising using first-party data. Here are 4 reasons why:
- Large User Base: Social media platforms have a massive user base, with Facebook alone having over 2.8 billion monthly active users. This means that there is a high likelihood that a company’s target audience is on social media, making it an ideal platform for advertising. TikTok is more recent but already has 1.05 billion monthly active users.
- First-Party Data Integration: Social media platforms allow for the integration of first-party data, enabling companies to leverage their own customer data to create more personalized and relevant ad campaigns. Usually called Custom Audiences, they’re particularly important in a post-cookie world, where first-party data is becoming increasingly valuable.
- Multiple Ad Formats: Social media platforms offer a range of ad formats, including image, video, carousel, and stories. This provides companies with the flexibility to create campaigns that are tailored to their specific goals and target audience.
- Ad Performance Tracking: Social media platforms provide detailed analytics and performance tracking, allowing companies to measure the success of their campaigns and make data-driven decisions to optimize their ad spend.
#3 Marketing Cloud Advertising integrations and features
Marketing Cloud Advertising allows you to associate Ad Accounts. You can add ad accounts for Facebook, Instagram, Google Ads, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, and Snapchat.
If you want to use TikTok, you can check my appexchange here.
Advertising Audiences
You can create Audiences for any ad account based on any data extension. In other words, as you target for your emails, you can target for Facebook, Instagram or Linkedin.
The Social Platform will only use matching data and won’t have a clue why nor how you segmented the pushed population.
Advertising with Journey Builder
Advertising Studio comes with 2 Journey Builder Activities:
- JB Ad Audience: to add or remove a subscriber from an ad audience
- JB Ad Campaign: to create an advertising campaign from within the Journey.
I pretty much like the idea of using ads as a channel in Journey Builder. Not sure about the Ad Campaign activity though.
If you want to learn more about Marketing Cloud Advertising, explore this Trailhead Module.
TL;DR
Marketing is about building relationships and social platforms are one of the best ways to do that.
- Third-Party Cookies death will deeply impact brands revenue
- Using First-Party data with Social Media Ads can help mitigate the impact
- Marketing Cloud Advertising is an available add-on to Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement that allows these use-cases.
Other ways I can help you: