How will web marketing change if third-party cookies are abolished?

Google has declared that it will abolish third-party cookies in Chrome, and web marketing is required to set up a cookie-less system. Sentry, which develops code performance diagnostic software, summarizes the case where they actually abolished third-party cookies from their own site.

We removed advertising cookies, here's what happened | Product Blog • Sentry
https://blog.sentry.io/we-removed-advertising-cookies-heres-what-happened/

Cookies are information that a website stores in your web browser, and records information such as the date and time you visited the site and the number of visits. Thanks to this cookie, you can log in to the same site again without entering your ID and password, and items can remain in your cart even if you leave the shopping site.

There are two types of cookies: first-party cookies and third-party cookies. First-party cookies are cookies issued by the website you check itself. Third-party cookies, on the other hand, are cookies issued by third parties, such as advertisements placed on websites.

Third-party cookies track behavior across multiple websites to determine what products a user is interested in or not. This enables 'targeted advertising,' which displays advertisements tailored to the user's interests.

However, this third-party cookie can lead to sharing of personal information with multiple companies and services even if the user has not consented, raising privacy concerns. As a result, Google is moving to phase out third-party cookies, and Chrome has announced plans to test it with 1% of users starting in Q1 2024, and then phase it out starting in Q3. .

Google releases schedule for abolishing third-party cookies, scheduled to start in 2024 - GIGAZINE

According to the statistical company Statcounter, the share of web browsers as of December 2023 is 64.7% for Chrome, 18.59% for Safari, 4.96% for Edge, and 3.35% for Firefox. Of these, Safari has already completely blocked third-party cookies by default since March 2020.

Apple's Safari completely blocks third-party cookies, first in popular browser - GIGAZINE

Chrome and Safari blocking third-party cookies means that third-party cookies will no longer work for many users, and web marketing that does not use third-party cookies will be necessary.

Therefore, Sentry seems to have abolished all third-party cookies on his site and looked for a method of web marketing. As a result, traditional Google Analytics, SEO reports, Google Ads smart automatic bidding, etc. became unusable, and the following unexpected problems were encountered.

・You can no longer embed YouTube on your website
・Google Click ID (GCLID) will no longer be issued
- Lookalike modeling options cannot be selected as data is not shared with advertising platforms
・Unable to integrate Salesforce and Google Ads
・Display ads and subscriptions from YouTube will be completely lost.
・Loss referrer data for content analysis

Sentry has adopted 'ad engagement retargeting' as a targeting method that does not use cookies. This is different from traditional retargeting ads that require third-party cookies, and is said to be provided by Meta, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Reddit. Furthermore, in order to promote engagement with ads, they are introducing video ads to gain recognition from users.

Additionally, the abolition of third-party cookies has had a major impact on the advertising bidding system. Google is the largest advertising platform, but by abolishing third-party cookies, it is no longer able to understand users' interests and purchase intentions, but only whether they have clicked on an ad.

Furthermore, by abolishing third-party cookies, you will no longer be able to use previous reports, and you will need to measure and analyze data using your own scripts. However, according to Sentry, if the UTM parameters and referrer data work properly, you can see which ads and campaigns are performing well.

Sentry says, “Our self-reported attribution analytics priority is helping us remove bias and discover new areas of expansion. It also helps us make sense of multiple pieces of data. We are also working on this. All of these will be the necessary limbs when we reach a cookie-less future.'

In addition, Sentry says, ``Going cookieless seems like a big undertaking with complex challenges, so it's understandable that you might want to put it off.However, whether you like it or not, a cookieless future is here. 'Moving to wireless networks will be a burden and require sacrifices, but it may give you new perspectives and learn about marketing while respecting user privacy.'