Why is Google Phasing Out Third-Party Cookies?
Revealed by Pew Research Centre, a sobering 72% of internet users felt that their data and browsing history were being tracked by advertisers and other companies. This led to a severe decrease in user trust. 81% of users also felt that the potential risk of data misuse outweighed the benefits (Google, 2021).
This is the reason for Google’s announcement in late August of 2019, saying they were moving towards building a more ‘private web’ through the use of the Privacy Sandbox and phasing out third-party cookies in Chrome.
Third-party cookies are present on countless websites, tracking your browsing behaviour and feeding the company with relevant information. This data is used for advertisement and retargeting. Hence why you may have felt a sense of deja-vu after searching for a product and having that exact product pop up in advertisement hours later on your Facebook newsfeed. You can thank third-party cookies for that creepy feeling.
Great for Users, Not So Great for Businesses?
As an individual, we want to ensure that our privacy is never compromised when surfing the web. However, what happens when we are a business owner looking to advertise? Will the removal of third-party cookies affect the way we are able to target audiences? In short, yes. However, this does not mean that specific and targeted advertising is out of the picture completely, it just means your digital marketing strategy needs be smartly adapted to work around this curveball.
Removing third-party cookies also does not mean that Google will cease all data collection. Consequently, as a user, Google will continue to use your data for advertising purposes. What is simply happening is that Google is no longer offering ads to target an individual’s browsing behaviour, creating look alike audiences and retargeting that group of individuals. Instead, advertising companies must directly find those individuals and audiences to target.
As always, Google is everchanging forcing us to be flexible to keep up with new algorithms and ways of working. Or alternatively, reverting back to older advertising strategies such as contextual targeting as opposed to behavioural targeting.
Advertising through Contextual Targeting
Contextual targeting is advertising by matching keywords and terms. This is mostly seen with Google PPC ads. You can define the list of keywords you want to target as well as provide a list of negative keywords you don’t want to target. For example, you are a B2B business looking to offer your services to other commercial businesses and you want to avoid selling to the general public or individual person, you may add ‘bulk’ or ‘commercial use’ to your keywords to ensure that you are showing up in the searches for businesses that are looking for your product.
Additional to your google ad appearing in the searches, another contextual ad can appear in a topic-related blog. Perhaps you are reading a blog on cleaning products, you may find that there is an ad blended in with the post displaying a cleaning product for sale. It’s seamless and less invasive than behavioural targeting.
Getting Your Advertising Strategy Right with Mink Media
Our job at Mink Media is to stay up-to-date and relevant with Google’s everchanging algorithm. Even with Google’s most recent scare to shut down due to the news media bargaining code, we never panicked and had an instantaneous solution. We protect businesses of all sizes and ensure that you’re always going to be found on the internet, one way or another.
Concerned about your advertising strategy? Speak with our professionals at Mink Media today on 0426 246 465 or email us at info@minkmedia.com.au.
