In 2021 many in digital advertisement talked about their cookieless strategies designed to future-proof targeting effectiveness in the post cookie-era.

However, while Australian brands have undoubtedly learned a lot last year about new targeting solutions, a report by the global industry body IAB is raising alarm bells.

In its fifth annual State of Data report, the IAB finds the deprecation of third-party cookies/IDs and cross-media addressability constraints are already impacting advertising measurement. The report laments there has been much talk, but little action, which has led to a false perception of preparedness in the industry.

The main concern is that a new privacy-centric solution ready to replace historical measurement practices has yet to emerge. With advertisers on the brink of losing important measurement functions, costs to maintain campaign ROAS could increase by as much as 200 per cent*.

Media planners down under too continued to rely on 3^rd party data, although the widespread use of Apple devices that restrict 3^rd party cookies and other IDs in place in Australia means that already today 55 per cent of users can no longer be identified across websites with traditional means (Teads Australia data, February 2022).

Teads global top cookieless markets:

As the impacts of 3^rd party cookie depreciation become imminent, advertisers and agencies will need to invest time and resources on implementing new targeting and measurement tools that are technically ready and are sustainable from a technical and regulatory perspective.

In the following we provide an overview of the five most important industry alternatives for the cookieless era and what you can expect from them.

The 5 Must Haves

1. Unique ID

Why you’ll want it: Unique IDs (UIDs) such as The Trade Desk’s Unified ID 2.0 are popular, because they offer a solution that fully restores the functions that 3^rd party cookies offer today. They also are privacy compliant as users need to provide consent to be targeted.

What it will get you: Unique IDs allow targeting of all audience types, including offline data, shopper data or income related data. However, as publishers face severe challenges to get users to sign up, this solution is not likely to cover your targeting needs at scale. In addition, the publisher 1^st party cookies UIDs rely on, may also face depreciation in the future, which pose some risk for this approach.

2. Publisher 1^st Party Data

Why you’ll want it: Publishers’ 1^st party cookies are not impacted from browser cookie removal. They allow continued identification of users and can serve measurement functions such as frequency.

What it will get you: While publisher 1^st party data is an important ingredient in contrast to UIDs, publisher data in its own right cannot identify user behaviour offline and is relatively siloed. In addition, smaller publishers find it challenging to cover all legal and technical prerequisites to collect user consent.

3. Predictive Targeting

Why you’ll want it: This targeting approach is probabilistic and can use real time predictions. For every online session an AI predicts into which audiences a user fits best. If the user fits into your campaign targeting the online bidding can proceed.

Predictions are based on online behaviour through analysis of cookieless data signals such as IP address, device, website, time, and context. However, for AI to carry out real-time profiling accurately, much data needs to be analyzed, giving ad tech players on the supply side an advantage. Based on IP addresses ad tech companies can also create user IDs.

However, this process called fingerprinting is rapidly becoming extinct due to privacy concerns and restriction to IP address information.

What it will get you: Predictive Audience targeting ticks not only the very important box for scale but offers a good balance in terms of accuracy and scale for the most important audience types like Ag & Gender as well as Interest categories with considerable granularity. Just as data is used to model their data segments, so predictive targeting can be fine-tuned to meet accuracy and scale demands.

Caveats are coverage of in-market data or personal data used on B2B campaigns.

4. Google Chrome Privacy Sandbox

Why you’ll want it: Google Chrome is the world’s largest browser and powers digital advertisement. The scale alone makes the solution must have.

Google’s approach promises scalable and privacy compliant targeting, based on a user’s reading behaviour in the browsers across multiple domains.

What it will get you: It’s too early to tell, but Google’s change from the envisioned FLOC cohort approach to the latest Topics API can be described as less ambitious on the one hand, but also more achievable on the other. A main caveat is individual user data will remain in the browser adding to the black box of Google’s digital ecosystem.

5. Contextual Targeting

Why you’ll want it: Contextual targeting whether based on simple keywords, advanced semantic analysis, or image analysis does not rely on user IDs at all. It is an elegant way to reach users in the moment when they are most receptive to marketing messages.

What it will get you: Good contextual targeting needs to overcome 3 challenges: Accuracy, Scale, Effectiveness. Accuracy can be achieved by analysing the importance of keywords for contextual interest topics and curating keyword groups.

While scale is inherently more limited than audience targeting, a hierarchically organised contextual catalog will allow control accuracy and scale as needed.

Stronger media effectiveness and ad memorisation often depends on the environment. An ad unit embedded in professional editorial content has distinct advantages over user generated contents or banners at the top of a page. Users slowly reading an engaging article will be more likely to respond positively to a non-intrusive creative aligned with their interests.

To address custom or 1st-party audience targeting needs, Teads have developed an innovative new product allowing you to target such audiences without cookies: the Teads Cookieless Translator. Teads has been pioneering the Cookieless world with effective solutions tested and validated by top brands around the world. Join their our Cookieless readiness program here.

About Teads

Teads work with 70 per cent of the ComScore top 500 in each region. In Australia  Teads reaches 99 per cent of the internet population. They offer audiences at scale other platforms cannot reach.

Teads’ analysis of online content consumption is at the core of their unique knowledge to deliver best in class semantic algorithms.

In 2021 Teads delivered over 50 per cent of all ad dollars spent on the platform with cookieless solutions, because they made cookieless solutions accessible for our clients, by introducing a new ‘Cookieless Mode’ in our buying interface.

Teads Ad Manager is an easy and transparent platform that gives advertisers the confidence to start testing. Their data solutions are seamlessly integrated into Teads Ad Manager and make it easy to set up A/B tests with sustainable audiences or advanced contextual targeting as well as their latest release the Teads Cookieless Translator.

Teads operates a leading, cloud-based, end-to-end technology platform that enables programmatic digital advertising across a global ecosystem of quality digital media. As an end-to-end solution, Teads’ modular platform allows partners to leverage buy-side, sell-side, creative, data and AI optimization technologies.

For advertisers and their agencies, Teads offers a single access point to buy the inventory of many of the world’s best publishers. Through exclusive global media partnerships, Teads enables advertisers and agencies to reach 1.9 billion unique monthly users** in brand safe, responsible advertising environments, while improving the effectiveness and efficiency of digital ad transactions.

Teads partners with the leading marketers, agencies and publishers through a team of 1,000+ people in 39 offices in 30 countries.

For more information on Teads Ad Manager and their cookieless solutions please contact anz@teads.com.

Sources:
*Common Thread Collective, 1/10/22 ; eMarketer, 11/5/21; MOLOCO
**Global reach as of October 2021
IAB’s State of Data Report 2022 Press Release Feb 8 2022
Teads Data: Japan Cookie Rate: Feb 23^rd 2022