The era of third-party tracking cookies slowly becomes the relic of the past. However, it’s not going to be as bad as you might think. Although some advertisers are concerned that they won’t be able to create effective and targeted ads, various solutions emerge and make it possible to provide users with relevant, contextual ads, without any privacy fears. Why are people worried about cookies and what does the cookieless future mean? Keep reading!
What are cookies?
Before we get to the heart of the matter, let’s briefly review what cookies are. In short, cookies are text files that store information about website visitors. They are placed on users’ devices (computers or mobile phones) when they visit a website for the first time.
Cookies allow website owners to:
• collect data about users’ behavior on their website,
• store visitors’ preferences,
• show relevant ads.
What are the disadvantages of cookies?
The problem with cookies is that they can be used to track users across the web without their knowledge or consent. Although this is important for some purposes, such as delivering personalized ads, it also raises serious privacy concerns.
With cookies, advertisers can build profiles of users’ interests and behavior and target them with relevant ads. This practice is called behavioral advertising.
In recent years, there has been a growing concern about online privacy. In response to this, different browsers (such as Safari, Firefox, have started to block third-party cookies. Google Chrome will be the next browser to phase out 3rd-party cookies. It’s scheduled for 2024.
As a result, the era of third-party tracking cookies is slowly coming to an end. This doesn’t mean that cookies will disappear completely – they will still be used for first-party purposes, such as remembering users’ preferences on a particular website.
This is when the cookieless future emerges.
What is cookieless future?
The cookieless future means that advertisers will have to find new ways to collect data about users and deliver relevant ads.
There are several ways to do this, such as:
• using first-party data,
• collecting data through server-side tagging,
• using probabilistic modeling.
How will it affect retargeting?
The cookieless future will definitely affect retargeting.
Retargeting is a type of online advertising that allows advertisers to show ads to users who have already visited their website. It’s usually done with the help of cookies, but it’s possible to do it without cookies, by using first-party data.
Retargeting will become more difficult in the cookieless future, but it’ll still be possible.
How to prepare for the cookieless future? The takeaway
The cookieless future is slowly becoming a reality. Although it might seem daunting at first, there’s no need to panic.
There are several ways to collect anonymized data about users and deliver relevant, personalized ads, without using cookies that raise numerous security and privacy concerns.
