Win in a Cookie-less World

Leveraging First-party Data to Win in a Cookie-less World

Is your business poised to survive the impending loss of third-party data? In a world where cookies are becoming increasingly scarce, how can you effectively target and target your customers and accurately measure attribution? Drop for Business has the only future-proof solution you can rely on, once the cookies start to crumble.

What are cookies?

Digital advertising has historically relied on a piece of data deliciously named the “cookie”. This benign-sounding nodule is widely used as a tracker of web activity; functioning as a small digital marker passed between a user’s browser and websites, to help site owners better understand their visitors’ online activity.

While the initial intent of the cookie was not to track user behavior on the internet, it quickly became commonplace. Personalized advertising unlocked by 1-to-1 tracking from cookies revealed new heights for digital marketers and digital marketing ROI. Cookie-based marketing began to play an integral role in the performance of multi-million dollar advertising campaigns on Facebook, YouTube, Reddit and many others.

Why are cookies disappearing?

Apple was the first major company to severely limit the ability of advertisers to track users on its devices – requiring consumer permission before tracking activity on websites and apps. Safari also limits the usage of cookie tracking, further restricting the details that advertisers can glean from an Apple device. While Apple is not strictly disallowing cookies from accessing Apple users, it is a fair assumption that, when asked, consumers will generally shy away from any form of tracking. These restrictions spelled a major shift in digital advertising, one that was further exacerbated by Google’s decision to limit the ability for cookie based tracking on its Chrome web browser.

What does this mean for businesses?

The restrictions put in place by Apple and Google have made it increasingly difficult to track users on the open web and businesses have been forced to adopt data collection at touchpoints within their direct control, like their websites and mobile apps. Nevertheless, such data collection techniques generally lack the granularity required for businesses to discern consumers’ intentions, preferences, lifestyle, etc.

Facing these limitations, businesses are looking to augment their data to unlock a holistic understanding of their market landscape. To do so, they are partnering with organizations specializing in consumer-permissioned collection of data. Partners that specialize in data collection must take a strategic approach to ensure that their datasets are accurate as well as ethically sourced. The modern consumer is informed and knowledgeable of the value of their data. As a result, consumers are more inclined to provide accurate and complete information when a clear exchange of value is proposed.

How can Drop for Business help?

Drop for Business maintains a growing consumer base of over 5 million members, representing an average of 2 million transactions per day. All transaction data is stored with bank-level security and scrubbed of identifying information to maintain a safe and anonymized data set. Members actively participate in sharing their data in exchange for monetary rewards in the form of Drop points – pushing a frontier forward in a world where consumers and permissioned data sets are the priority.

Advertisers are now able to leverage Drop’s ethically sourced, permissioned, first-party data sets in lieu of the advertising cookie to drive efficient and scalable campaigns far into the future, while driving significantly more value for both their brand and the end consumer.