Select Page

Getting real about third-party cookies

Aug 2, 2021 | AI & ML

Google’s announcement to extend the demise of third party cookies, is an opportune time for brands to prioritize first-party data – allowing brands more time to rebuild the road to a sustainable long-term solution that drives better results. The demise of the third-party cookie can be seen as a blessing for brands – allowing them to thrive in a completely new digital marketing world moving away from a focus on cookie-based audiences and towards a focus on user experience & behavior by prioritizing first party data. For the tech giants of the world such as Facebook, Amazon and Apple, this change will have little to no impact on them as they are already heavily relying on first-party data through accounts, subscriptions and purchases. This is why brands need to start thinking about building their first-party data now to start forming valuable and legitimate relationships with the shoppers visiting their website. 

Prioritize first-party data

Privacy and personalization is a paradox. Shoppers want to continue to receive personalized experiences at the same time as protecting their privacy. Let’s face it, third party cookies have a bad rep as consumers notoriously don’t trust them and get annoyed by them, which in turn reflects on your brand. So, what’s the solution? Put your first party data to work. 

91% of shoppers are more likely to shop with brands that provide offers and recommendations that are relevant to them

80% of shoppers are more likely to make a purchase from a brand that provides personalized experiences

63% of shoppers will stop buying from brands that use poor personalization tactics

Third party cookies have limited targeting capabilities and inaccurate attribution. The loss of these third party cookies is an opportunity for brands to focus efforts on a higher calibre & targeted group of shoppers – providing real value & personalized experiences at every stage of the buying journey. As today’s savvy online shoppers have access to multiple devices, the need to be consistent across all devices and touchpoints is more important than ever.

Third-party cookies don’t recognize the customer but only recognize the device which means your personalization efforts are limited. With first party data you can provide hyper personalized experiences across the entire buying journey no matter how the consumer chooses to shop. If you’d like to discuss how Knexus can leverage first party data to provide hyper personalized eCommerce journeys, book a demo the Knexus team.

The role of AI & ML in a cookieless world

AI and ML can help brands provide personalized experiences without the need to know who the customer is – due to the technology’s ability to learn what messaging, content, and products for example, resonate with each individual customer. Unlike third party cookies, AI enables brands to predict the behaviors & actions of consumers by identifying patterns & gathering data driven insights. Lets take contextual AI for example – this leverages the power of Machine Learning to not replace, but augment human thinking and understanding of your customers and content. For brands, this means being able to provide shoppers with relevant, valuable content without the need for third-party data. Brands should think about whether or not to adopt an AI platform that could potentially help provide personalized experiences across the entire buying journey. 

Knexus supports first-party data

Knexus creates anonymous visitor cookies which are treated as first party cookies as they are deployed on the brand’s domain through visitor tracking. The events Knexus tracks are passed via tracking API to Knexus in real-time and not stored in cookies. Knexus tracks the real-time behaviour anonymously confined to the client’s website but can also work with brands to gather gather other first and third party datasets for segment level/one to one personalization. 

Knexus allows brands to provide personalized experiences throughout the entire buying journey across the ecommerce store, paid search campaigns, mobile app and CRM campaigns, at the same time as protecting each shopper’s privacy. It’s a win, win.