Despite speculation arising over the exact date we’ll lose third-party cookies, advertisers must think beyond basic privacy requirements and be prepared regardless of the deprecation timeline. It has long been common for advertisers to use third-party cookies to target, pace, measure, and personalize campaigns – and this will need to change. 

First-Party Data, it’s a Good Thing; Get to Know your Audience. 

With the loss of third-party data, advertisers have jumped (or more appropriately been forced) into a new arena – having no choice but to finally dive into the heaps of data we’ve been collecting for years – preparing more focused strategies using owned data. 

By analyzing first-party data, we can provide customer-centric experiences to help retain existing customers, gain new customers, and drive revenue growth with a greater understanding of our customers.

What is first-party data: “First-party data is the information you collect directly from your audience or customers. First-party data includes: Behaviors, actions, or interests displayed across your website(s) or app(s).”

Learn more about first-party data in our whitepaper; Tomorrow’s World – Living with First-Party Data.

Download the Whitepaper

Using Dynamic Creative Optimization as a First-Party Activation Initiative. 

There are many strategic initiatives that will fuel a durable data-led first-party strategy. 

Quick Tip: Your strategic initiatives should be built on three pillars: 

• Collection and Infrastructure for 1P
• Vehicles for 1P activation
• Measuring & Testing 1P 

When planning to activate collected first-party data, one of the first strategic initiatives to consider is Dynamic Creative Optimization (DCO). DCO, pertains to creative design, driven by first-party data (not limited to just first-party data) and using technology to power campaigns by creating a wide variety of ads to fit any circumstance. When done correctly, you have the opportunity to scale creatives relevant to consumers. 

DCO was primarily used for retargeting high-value consumers at the bottom of the funnel. This was especially popular in the retail industry where there are large volumes of possible permutations. Now, with years of successful cases across the industry we know that DCO is powerful across any part of the media funnel, and specifically thrives with first-party data. It is the perfect vehicle for personalizing messaging and best product fit to your consumer. 

Blended results from our clients – first party data allows you to:

• Make informed decisions to boost campaign performance and effectiveness.

• Offers an enhanced audience strategy

• Boost competitiveness. 

• Future-proof machine learning.

(Source)

Low-Hanging Fruits – data that can be easily activated. 

Often it is pointed out that DCO is a complex initiative – and as a result it is either overlooked or poorly executed. The good news is that this simply isn’t true, and there are many opportunities to get started with right now. 

Step 1 – Identify your first-party data sources

If you’re familiar with Google Analytics (and are using it today) then you already have a good foundation of data collection in place. With GA360 and/or GA4 you can categorize website behavioral data into defined audience buckets and push those data segments into Display & Video 360. 

We ran a similar campaign strategy to this for South African mobile data-only network, rain, who wanted to drive down their CPA and increase users engagement on site. We analyzed GA360 data and identified top converting/top engaging segments to create audiences linked to DV360. We kept the creatives consistent across all line items – comparing the performance of the remarketing line items with GA360 audiences to the performance of the remarketing line items that did not have GA360 audiences. By adding a new level of relevancy to their audience targeting we drove a 72% decrease in CPA, an 106% increase in pages per session and a 211% increase in session duration.

Dependency: Reliant on your onsite measurement strategy. ‘What you tag, is what you get.’

Step 2 – Identify how you are applying your first-party data using DCO

Prepare your creative. At Incubeta we use a proprietary technology, Seamless Creative that allows us to build DCO iterations at scale, however, this can be done manually without scaling tools – the only consideration will be – you need more time. 

Here is what is needed to get started:

1. The Ad Layout that serves as the template or “shell” of the ad. Dynamic ad templates must be built in order to replace each element without individually reformatting each iteration of the ad.  
2. Define the Dynamic Attributes this contains the content that is used to tailor aspects of the ad for specific audiences.  
3. Link GA360 or GA4 Audience Segments with Display and Video 360 and build your DCO data strategy based on the segments as it will need to know how and for whom to personalize the ad. 

Dependency: Identify a partner or internal team member with experience in building Rich Media Formats using HTML.

Step 3 – Prepare to test your strategy in your media campaigns

It is time to launch your campaign. With your DCO strategy ready, your media strategy must be prepared for the segments you wish to target. In this step your media strategy will act as the driving force for creative permutations. It is here where media teams are empowered to set up Line Items that are targeted at specific consumer journeys and allow your creative automation implemented in the previous steps to take control. 

Dependency: Media teams must have a good understanding of building customer-centric media setups. 

Using DCO successfully with clients.

When Multichoice came to us, wanting to capitalize on the fervor and engagement generated by the FIFA World Cup, we knew we could use Data Driven Creatives to create hyper localized experiences to drive awareness and gain new subscribers. 

By utilizing the full integrated Google Marketing Platform (GMP) stack to execute our Data Driven Creatives, we drove improved media efficiency and an over performance of our initial KPI’s, along with a significant reduction in operational time spent and production using dynamic creative. Overall the campaign drove a 29% decrease in benchmark CPA and 94% conversions post click. The pilot project’s success is a great proof of concept to demonstrate the benefits of Data Driven Creatives to more brands within the group.

Check out the full case study: Improving Media Efficiency for Multichoice Brands. 

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When it comes to consumer strategies we must consider that the future is private. Personalized experiences can still be offered when you put the right first-party strategic initiatives in place. Creating a robust first-party data strategy is not a one-and-done process. As you move forward, you will define targets, track your results, and optimize. 

Your first-party data strategy must be measured before you begin using it, not just on the various channels where your data is applied, but also on a broader scale.

Want to learn more about DCO and how to creatively approach volatility within the digital marketing space? Watch our latest event, The Art of Chaos, where we discussed how to make the most of your marketing, how to accept uncertainty, and how to survive, and thrive, in times of uncertainty. 

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