Soon there will be no more “3rd party” cookies in the Chrome browser (the last major one that still supports them). We don’t know exactly when, but we already know that they will disappear for sure. Tomek Kuisz wrote about the world without cookies on the pages of CMO Insider here.
This topic is important for marketers for many reasons, but I would like to draw your attention to one of them. This situation is a perfect opportunity to take a look at our level of digital marketing maturity.
No one doubts that digital marketing is an area that has grown incredibly rapidly in recent years. A side effect of such growth is always a certain level of “creative chaos”. Certain elements and areas develop independently of each other, some much faster, others slower, some remain in-house and still others are completely outsourced to specialized partners. The consequence is that often no one in the company can answer the questions in a short and concise but comprehensive way: How do we do our digital marketing? What data and technologies do we use? How do we measure the results of those efforts?
Such a significant change as the elimination of “3rd party cookies” is the perfect time to take a kind of inventory and comprehensively assess your level of maturity in data-driven digital marketing.
Firstly, it is much needed in order to embed the cookie issue in your strategy and provide context to the discussion on the topic. Secondly, the specificity of the cookie challenge is that there is no simple solution that can be left entirely in the hands of agencies and partners. Thus, all indications are that there will not be a 1:1 replacement for the “3rd party cookie,” but rather a “patch” that, like game bugs, will fix the situation. Solutions will be based on proprietary data, unique platform configurations and individual partnerships. Companies need to take a much more deliberate look at their marketing transformation strategy.
There are many tools available on the market to assess digital maturity in the communications space. These often come from consulting companies. It is worth remembering that a good and useful digital marketing competency assessment requires a very practical view and knowledge of the nuances of the tools used. In other words, while it should not run away from strategic issues, it must be firmly rooted in everyday practice. Secondly, this should not be a long and complicated process. This is a constantly changing environment, and if a company wants to take a comprehensive look at its competencies, it should be able to do so efficiently and without overly complex processes. There are also completely self-service tools on the market in the form of online surveys.
A good example is the self-service tool created by Google in collaboration with BCG: Digital Maturity Benchmark. In case of such solutions you need to ask yourself a question: do I have all the necessary knowledge to complete such a survey. Often this is not at all obvious if many tasks related to digital activations are performed by agencies and various partners. The key point here is also that a maturity assessment alone is not as valuable as an efficiently developed and specific plan of initiatives that will raise the maturity level on the defined dimensions within a defined time frame. Developing and implementing this plan will drive real business results. Finally, do not forget that the maturity assessment tool used should not “favor” a particular technology environment. In principle, this is not necessarily a bad thing, but it only makes sense if our marketing relies very heavily on a particular technological environment.
Naturally, Publicis Groupe supports its clients wishing to make an overall assessment of digital and precision marketing maturity with its own DMI (Digital Maturity Index) approach. It is based on 4 assumptions:
- A joint project team. A joint agency and client team (often multiple departments) at both maturity assessment and initiative plan building stages. Our experience shows that such a “team” can achieve an optimal result in a relatively short time.
- Efficiency of implementation. As far as time is concerned, our assumption is that such projects up to the stage of a ready roadmap of initiatives should not exceed several weeks, after which implementation can start. The maturity assessment comes down to two short online workshops and a basic web analytics audit. Developing a roadmap of initiatives for discussion and approval, on the other hand, is generally achieved through one longer workshop.
- Comprehensiveness We try to take various aspects affecting digital marketing and personalization into account. Firstly – we have the structure aspects (marketing KPIs, team collaboration, process, competencies) secondly – the collected data and the technologies used to do so, thirdly – how communication is conducted (segments, channels, owned, acquired, commerce, content, etc.), fourthly – how analytics and optimization are conducted.
- Neutrality The primary task is to determine what initiatives to improve maturity in digital marketing make sense and how they should be done. Further, the agency can support the client in the teasing phase, but this is not always valid and is not available for all projects . It is crucial that the clients have full control over the development of their digital strategies and competences.
For more details I invite you to contact me: Krzysztof.sobieszek@publicisgroupe.com
