Massive changes ranging from government regulation to moves by big tech players are coming and they are threatening marketers’ ability to build relationships with consumers. These changes include:

• Disparate local data privacy laws from state to state is challenging and costly, creating confusion for marketers and consumers alike. This causes tension, distrust, and complexity.
• Hardening of walled gardens by entities like Facebook and Google are making it increasingly difficult for marketers to understand their target audience. This makes measuring the impact of marketing efforts or return on investment nearly impossible.
• Apple is blocking marketers from seeing email opens on iOS devices making it difficult to measure email marketing effectiveness to this segment of their audience.

We wanted to learn more about marketers concerns around data privacy, so we assembled a panel of marketing executives and asked them:

1. How familiar they are with these changes, how concerned they are, and what questions they have about these topics.
2. How they are or plan to navigate this data landscape, to ensure they maintain meaningful relationships with their consumers.
3. Who they are relying on as they prepare for this future.

Here’s what they had to say.

Frequent changes and unclear expectations

Some leaders feel they should wait to see what happens to avoid taking unnecessary risks while things are rapidly shifting, while others wonder if it would be more advantageous to forge forward aggressively. Then there are some that feel as if they’ve worked through changes successfully before and plan to proceed accordingly as things continue to evolve.

Jantzen Cole, MS expressed this sentiment when he said, “Wrestling with the question…is it better to ‘wait and see’ or are there market advantages for being more aggressive and taking risks while things are murky, or is there too much liability?”

Unsure how algorithms work

Our panelists have many questions about how all these changes impact their business, how the algorithms work, where they’ll get reliable data, and how they will effectively market to the desired audience. They are also concerned that consumers will be displeased with less personalized messaging.

Anvesha Poswalia expressed her questions about big tech’s algorithms by saying, “The ‘hardening of walled gardens’ comes with no clarity on exactly how these algorithms work. And the data is not available outside of these platforms. In a cookie-less world, it will be even more difficult to understand how the audience is being segmented and retargeted, making it more complex and unclear.”

What solutions work and what’s reliable guidance

Many leaders are focused on ways to overcome industry challenges by leveraging new platforms and creating more relevant content. Others are turning to established and emerging technology platforms to guide them. But none are entirely certain what will work best or where to find the best guidance.

Jantzen Cole, MS echoed the sentiment expressed by our panelists when he stated, “I’m looking for niche’ portals that give me customer context, and intimate access to data and communication. Fortunately, social media continues to generate new platforms to introduce us to new customers in engaging ways.”

The New Way Forward

Let’s face it: big tech is not your friend. Big tech players continue to move the goalposts and marketers have to find a workaround. The question remains, how can marketers scale the walled gardens being placed and built up by big tech?

PII data is paving a new way forward on understanding true engagement and allowing marketers big and small to connect with real people.

PII data allows marketers to:

1. Achieve greater efficiency given one true profile can be managed by just one data provider that can manage preferences
2. Access a true, accurate view of the single person you are targeting
3. Better protect the consumer’s choice to opt-out in some places and opt-in in others with more simplicity around how those preferences are enforced
4. Have better security versus persona-based, anonymized data that is shared and passed around ad nauseum

Are you ready to learn more about PII? Get in touch with us today.