Digitl | Building a Privacy-Safe 1st Party Data Strategy

Building a Privacy-Safe 1st Party Data Strategy

2022-07-12 | Article | Insights

Why does a privacy-safe 1st party strategy make sense?

A 1st party data strategy is becoming increasingly important in light of the 3rd party cookie changes. The gathered data, which is now collected in accordance with the privacy and consent of the customer, can contribute significantly to establishing a valuable relationship with customers. This can lead to better marketing campaigns and therefore increased marketing efficiency, if the collected web and app data is used in the right measure and with responsibility.

These points can help find the right approach:

Define the business goals.
Know your customers and know their needs.
Align these needs with the data.
Define the data that has to be tracked (what and where).
Offer value in exchange of data.
Evaluate tools to track and measure data and select one.
Implement the tracking codes.
Start to measure and analyze data.
Develop your data roadmap step-by-step and start with the first use cases.
Continuously develop the team with workshops into data topics.

All of these points can help define a 1st party data strategy that is right for the business. Data brings information and information brings knowledge. Thanks to this knowledge, customers can be offered better user experiences on the website as well as added value in the sense of products that better meet their needs.

The changing data privacy landscape

Data protection regulations are changing how companies can collect and modify data. The new privacy regulations give users more influence to decide whether or not they consent to share their data.

The points below give some insight into the legitimate interests that lead to this change and shed light on which of these can be used as opportunities, such as the Privacy Sandbox, Consent Mode, and Server-side Tracking.

GDPR
Apple iOS 14 Update
Cookieless Future
Privacy Sandbox
Consent Mode
Server Side Tracking

What does this mean and what impact will it have on my data strategy?

Tracking and targeting in its current form will change.
1st party data is therefore becoming increasingly important, as we will soon arrive in a cookieless future.
There will be new forms of tracking with server-side tracking.
This can also be seen as an opportunity to re-define tracking.
Data collection must be re-defined and it must be evaluated how CRM, CDP, and marketing and cloud tools can be used in symbiosis with each other.
More attention needs to be paid to data protection. The customer's consent offers opportunities to increase communication with the customer and to respect the customer's privacy.

There are a lot of changes that are coming to the companies here. The points mentioned above show it. It is a very good time to take advantage of this opportunity and to re-think and approach these changes strategically with regard to 1st party data. This way, you are prepared for the future and can scale your business thanks to the 1st party data and the new technology that makes it possible.

Data and tools infrastructure

This overview gives a small insight into how to use the topic with Google Cloud and Google Marketing Platform in connection with your own CDP / CRM tools. The information is processed with various ML models in the Google Cloud and on the right side data can be visualized or used for use cases in other tools with their own CDP or again in the Google Marketing Platform (DV360 or Google Optimize).

From a strategic point of view, it is important to unify the 1st party data also with regard to the various tools. This way, data gaps can be closed. It is best to connect your data in such a way that this valuable information can be combined and then used. This figure shows how to connect and use the data streams. Privacy is also taken into account thanks to CMP, which can be used in combination with Consent Mode. Thus, tracking data, information and from the information valuable knowledge is gained, which can be used for exciting use cases.

Conclusion

Define data, measure data and use data to engage the customer for action. With a clear and structured process, a 1st party data strategy that is coordinated with all stakeholders and external partners can succeed. The procedure described at the beginning can help. The earlier the topic is addressed, the earlier the data can be used. The following three building blocks are solved.