The death of the cookie as we know it
No more cookies for you. No, not the ones you snack on and blame for your weight-gain. We’re talking about the miniature files that your browser stores every time you visit any website. Everyone on the Internet wants to keep track of your browsing habits and history. Everyone wants to sell you something. You are the data and money source for all of them. Especially for the websites which offer you seemingly free services. Think…the Facebooks of the world.
These so-called ‘free’ service providers were able to convince websites to let them include these tracing files we know as cookies. They come with every page you load on your computer. It is supposed to help marketers provide you with better targeted ads. I’m not convinced that should be allowed, but then again, nothing you do on the internet is private. True, there are ways to minimize what cookies share, but that takes effort, and few are unwilling to go through that effort, or even know how.
Governments decided that enough is enough. They did step up to protect your privacy (that concept, in and of itself, is ironic. But let's go with the flow). The European Union introduced the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and other countries or states adopted similar regulations as well. Use of cookies and processing cookie data are part of the protection plan.
Two companies stepped up and decided to help with the fight against privacy intrusion. They are Apple and Google.
You may recall a speech by Apple CEO Tim Cook. He announced at a privacy conference in February 2021 that tracking people is not cool and singled out Facebook as a major offender. That was the beginning of the end for Facebook.
The combination of the Facebook tracking pixel which is embedded in almost every mobile application, combined with a Facebook cookie, tracks you and your activities across the Internet. By contrast, Apple now allows you to disable pixel tracking, and its own browser Safari now blocks third-party cookies, cookies which do not support a website’s functionality.
Google is redesigning its entire analytics tracking system, and will also disablethird party cookies in its flagship (and most used) Chrome browser later this year. This is not welcome news for businesses, which rely on cookies to target advertising to their users.
These changes are sending shockwaves through the advertising industry. Internet users must be ecstatic that their privacy will be a little bit more protected.
As always, there is the fine print, the asterisk, the proverbial question: cui bono?
Who does stand to gain indeed…
First of all, the websites themselves will still be able to use cookies. That's called first-party cookies. They are used to remember your last visit, or the contents of your abandoned shopping cart, for example.
As a marketer you would then ask, how could I connect with my potential audience? Well, if you have a website with lots of organic (non-paid) traffic, you can become more proactive and get your visitors to sign-up for newsletters, take surveys, polls or anything which would reveal information about your audience.
But what if your site has little organic traffic? What happens when you depend on Google Ads and subsequent retargeting to run your marketing campaigns? Fortunately, Google is introducing the Privacy Sandbox. Its objective states that 'the Privacy Sandbox project’s mission is to ‘create a thriving web ecosystem that is respectful of users and privacy by default.’” The main challenge to overcome in that mission is the pervasive cross-site tracking that has become the norm on the web. On top of that, much of the web’s ability to deliver and monetize content has already been built.
Cui bono?
Apple is not going to lose a thing. Every user of its devices and their usage is already a known entity to Apple. Apple can market to them directly. Plus, it enforces its brand for taking privacy and security seriously.
Websites with sizable traffic can start charging much higher prices for access to its visitors.
But the biggest winner will be Google which controls the Web Analytics market. Now it will run the Privacy Sandbox, which will provide first-hand data only to Google. Governments just helped Google neutralize the competition.
Is this the end? Will the bigger companies completely take over
No. This will last a few more years. There is this new thing on the horizon called Web3. And it will disrupt the 'old companies' in a much bigger way. Right now, Web3 is mostly associated with cryptocurrencies, blockchain, DeFi and other trendy words, but it will be the new way people interact with the web. It will provide frictionless, direct communication between the user and the visiting website. Predetermined privacy, value and transaction criteria settings will be seamlessly exchanged.
Here is a scenario: You are browsing the internet and land on a news website. You read the first article for free. Do you want to read the second article? If you provide the year when you were born, you get to read your second article for free. Also, you might see an ad for a subscription offering you a 30% discount if you share the make of a car you are driving.
Yes, over simplified. The point is that you would be able to negotiate the transaction with anyone directly. You will determine how much you are willing to spend or how much personal information you are willing to divulge. And all that will happen behind the scenes.
It always seems that big companies control the market and can't be displaced and will be here forever. Yet, we had Sears, Blockbuster, Yahoo. Then came Amazon, Netflix, Google. So don’t be fooled into thinking Facebook and Twitter are the be all, end all. That's the beauty and fun of the times we live in. This is the recurrent pattern.