Prioritising Privacy

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As more and more consumers opt for higher privacy in their online interactions, digital marketers must now resort to creative measures to strategically tackle the challenge of offering personalised.

 

 nline user data has been a gold mine for digital marketers ever since targeted campaigns began. However, consumers are gradually becoming more aware and uncomfortable with their daily data collection. Major brands must understand that the way they organise, invest, perceive audiences and interact with customers needs to change in line with people’s renewed preference for privacy. These concerns are emerging as a major hindrance to the way companies do business. Needless to say, policies surrounding them are being reshaped across industries through regulation and actions by governments and major tech giants. As such, traditional digital marketing strategies, and the marketing ecosystem as we know it, are getting drastically disrupted.

DATA PRIVACY AND ITS ROLE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
From advertising to emails, consumer data is leveraged by organisations to customise the journey for a particular client and curate relevant, engaging and seamless experiences for them. However, an increasing number of users are now becoming alert about privacy violations. A recent survey found that 97% of them are “somewhat concerned” to “very concerned” regarding personal data protection and about being targeted based on information they don’t remember opting to share. From receiving emails from unknown brands to more mainstream scams such as the Cambridge Analytica scandal, online privacy breaches infuriate individuals and tarnish their trust in brands that manage data in dubious ways. Data privacy gives customers control over how and how much of their personal data, demographic and financial details, among other things, third-party organisations can use.
THE CHANGING DATA PRIVACY LANDSCAPE
To address rising privacy concerns, governments and tech leaders in recent years have responded with policies that have created seismic shifts in the data protection and privacy environment. Firefox now prevents tracking cookies by default. Google has joined in on the cookie crusade and plans to phase out the death of the cookie in its Chrome browser by as early as 2023. A new version of Google Analytics has been rolled out to address overarching privacy concerns for its users.
Apple, in a unique and unprecedented move, limited tracking on iPhones in 2021 and users of iOS 14.5 now have to consciously opt-in to share their unique Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA) with app owners. Not surprisingly, the Big 4 tech firms lost USD 278 billion. Similarly, DuckDuckGo, a search engine that boasts increased privacy for its users, has seen a 65% increase in traffic. When the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) was passed by the European Union in 2018, organisations had to allow users in the region to collect personal data and show them how their data was being used whenever they wanted. This set off a range of similar regulations around the world. The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) also followed suit in the same year, detailing new privacy rights for consumers in the state of California. Even though identity-secure solutions like Google’s Topics API should bring options to reach the now anonymous users, greater opt-out rates and stiff regulations may lead to a probable fall in audience visibility. The initiatives are indicative of the fact that the prime days of unlimited granular customer data are nearing their end.

IMPACTS OF DATA PRIVACY ON MARKETERS TODAY
Changes regarding data privacy in the last few years have hit marketing teams very hard. Brands and agencies now have to reorganise and re-equip their digital capacities around a 70/30 privacy-oriented audience, split in an environment where 70% of users are opting for increasingly persistent digital anonymity, leaving only 30% of identified digital consumers directly targetable by brands. Additionally, a recent Gartner research has discovered that about 20% of marketers report privacy compliance as their main concern across all marketing channels. Around 73% of marketers fear that privacy concerns will negatively impact their analytics efforts. Evidently, therefore, challenges in being able to gather data and generate insights will render previous marketing tech obsolete and fuel the need for new technology to take its place. Alternatively, other studies have found that data misuse can have negative consequences for brands, with about 8 out of 10 customers stating that they’re willing to leave a brand if their data is used without their knowledge.

To address rising privacy concerns, governments and tech leaders in recent years have responded with policies that have created seismic shifts in the data protection and privacy environment.

However, even though almost every consumer is asking for more privacy, an entire 63% of consumers also believe personalisation should be standard when they’re being served or sent promotional offers. This perplexing situation has left marketers stuck between a rock and a hard place, wondering how to meet consumer demands without access to adequate consumer data. Keeping the situation in mind, it is not a surprise that Gartner predicted that 80% of marketers will abandon personalisation efforts by 2025.
STRATEGIES TO SUCCEED
So what do businesses do now with their growth trajectories dependent on consumers’ data, cookies and last-click attribution? There is still hope for data-driven marketers who want to respect data privacy and target their consumers at a hyper-segmented level. While it was easy to categorise content to very specific groups in the past, the new constraints on digital marketing are forcing a transition from acute data reliance and tracking to an improved overall messaging that resonates with a greater audience.
Increase transparency in data collection
Including easily accessible privacy laws, cookies & terms and conditions as pop-ups will allow customers to easily opt-out of shared data and feel more secure while browsing the site of a particular company. Users must be given plenty of opportunities to opt-in or out of specific options, like email campaigns. The clearer digital marketers are on these practices, the less likely companies are to face a complaint or monetary fine along the way. The key is to provide transparency and give consumers the choice to refuse when it comes to participating in marketing activities.
Invest in first-party data-centric tech infrastructure
Marketers must continue to utilise data-led approaches and build a technical infrastructure that can support this. Even though data privacy is fundamentally changing the way brands target users, owned data is still a foundational component of an efficient marketing program.

Provide incentives for information
A fantastic way to connect with customers is through customer satisfaction insights. Instead of relying on specific individuals to opt-in to generic data sharing, it may pay to give them a ‘gated offer.’ Simply put, companies can offer promotional discounts in exchange for personal insights and information. A startup in the UK has begun offering this as a third-party service a few years ago. The method encourages outgoing individuals to provide data and offers transparency and easy opt-out options for the more private clientele.

Build beyond the crumbling of the cookie
It’s vital for brands to figure out how the removal of cookies next year will impact the broader organisation and its marketing efforts. Companies will need to build their strategy for reaching known users and anonymous users differently, and understand how to effectively gauge the performance of each method.

Adopt new metric paradigms
Marketers must create a new measurement paradigm that can comprehend investment across opaque test environments and a permanently changed ad tech ecosystem. A way to sidestep the challenges associated with data privacy concerns is to optimise creative strategies. Instead of creating only individualised ad experiences, it may be prudent to take a look at metrics and campaign effectiveness on a macro level. This way, companies can target substantial numbers of consumers without the need for their specific data. The more digital marketers can look at the bigger picture, the easier it will be to improve the overall message at an optimal level. Integrated brand metrics that bring together positioning, advertising, content effectiveness, market performance and satisfaction will be critical in fine-tuning brands and future-proofing them. Onboarding identity-based marketing techniques that are transparent, privacy compliant and integrated with CRMs will ensure further success.

Focus on quality content
Marketers must have a clear grasp of what the brand stands for so that they can clearly align their actions to consumers’ requirements. Instead of trying to meet basic messaging needs for a lot of small demographics, businesses should focus on creating impactful ads and media content that meets the needs of many, in one go, and then distribute it in audience-aligned destinations. These destinations could be places like The Economist, Amazon, and other websites and could even include influencers’ social media pages. Adapting to this ‘messaging for many’ approach can make all the difference in areas like brand positioning and sales retention.

 

Data misuse can have negative consequences for brands, with about 8 out of 10 customers stating that they’re willing to leave a brand if their data is used without their knowledge.

Grow ad and communication frequency
To stay on top of consumers’ minds, it is imperative that companies increase the number of times they connect with the audience. Marketers, therefore, must increase the frequency of ads for their customers and keep reminding them of their presence. Similarly, rather than relying on one excellent message to resonate with a target customer numerous times, marketers must design creative content and communicate with their customers through multiple channels.
As the relationship between data privacy and digital marketing landscapes becomes increasingly complex, consumer behaviour, on the whole, does not seem to show much difference. As such, it seems as if companies have to go back to the ‘good old days of advertising’ where creatives would take a bird’s eye view instead of focusing on each customer individually. To cope with this new reality of data privacy, digital marketers must adopt some new strategies (and revert back to some old ones) to maintain a delicate balance that respects user privacy and provides tailored digital experiences.

The writer is a seasoned professional who works with global business, disruptive technology and business processes. He can be reached at maimun.m@gmail.com

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