Ever found yourself wondering why ads for that smartwatch you peeked at on Amazon are following you all over the internet? That is due to the use of third-party cookies. In today’s episode, we are going to dive into third-party cookies & their imminent departure in 2024.
From why the era of third-party cookies is ending to how their removal can affect advance marketing tactics, we'll discuss what this means for your business strategy and online habits.
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Episode Transcript
We have a lot of clients asking us about the
third-party cookie phase-outthat's coming.
That's kind of a mouthful tosay.
You may or may not have heardof it yet.
Not having third-party cookiescan be a big deal for some and
less so for others.
So let's dive right in intowhat third-party cookies are,
what is being affected and whatour next steps are.
(00:24):
Welcome to the eComcommerce madeeasy podcast.
I'm your host, k Saunders.
When we started this business,all I had was a couch, a laptop
and a nine month old.
My main goal to help others.
Now, with over 20 years in thee-commerce building industry and
even more than that in webdevelopment, I have seen a lot.
I love breaking down the hardtech and the easily
understandable bits to helpothers be successful in their
(00:46):
online business.
Whether you're a seasonede-commerce veteran or just
starting out, you've come to theright place.
So sit back, relax and let'sdive into the world of
e-commerce together.
Welcome back to another episodeof the E-Commerce Made Easy
podcast.
I'm your host, k Saunders.
Today, we're diving intothird-party cookies.
You may be wondering whatexactly is a third-party cookie?
(01:08):
They are basically trackingcookies that are placed on your
computer after being generatedby another website rather than
the one that you're currently on.
So, for example, let's sayyou're searching for a new
smartwatch on Amazon and thenyou go to another site later in
the day, or maybe the next dayor so, and you get an
advertisement for one of thesmartwatches you looked at on
(01:31):
this new website and it's awebsite you didn't search for
smartwatches on that utilizesthe data from a third-party
cookie to retarget your interestin that product.
So third-party cookies havemade it so much easier to target
ads back to you on otherwebsites.
I'm sure you've experienced thisnumerous times I know that I
(01:55):
have and sometimes nearChristmas time I have to be
particularly careful and takespecial measures to either block
or delete these third-partycookies so that I don't give
away the things I was buying forfamily members or for others
for gifts for Christmas.
Have you ever done that?
I know there's been times inthe past before I was browsing a
(02:15):
new website and there was anadvertisement.
I was like, oh no, that'sexactly what my kid was looking
for.
They'll know that I bought itif they see this advertisement.
So once that happened to meabout once, I was very careful
to block or delete thesethird-party cookies so I didn't
give away things like that to myfamily members that might be
seeing what I'm browsing on ourwebsite.
I didn't want them to know whatChristmas gifts I got them
(02:38):
right.
You want that to be a surprise.
So later this year, googleChrome will be doing away with
third-party cookies, and they'reactually slowly rolling this
out already now, in 2024.
And this is March or April 2024.
I almost lost track when it wasso.
They're already starting toroll this out in 2024, and it's
going to completely go away bythe end of 2024.
(02:59):
And, as a typical businessowner, this actually won't
affect you too much.
I actually don't see very manybusiness owners use third-party
cookies very much.
It's most likely going toaffect those that use advanced
marketing techniques to retargetto their customers.
So why is Google Chrome andother web browsers getting away
(03:20):
from these third-party cookies?
It seems pretty harmless totrack your shopping habits at
first, right?
Well, in the worst-casescenario, though, third-party
cookies are used to track usersacross the Internet and across
the web, building up, time aftertime and as time goes by,
detailed profile of users thatcan not only include their
(03:43):
shopping interests, which couldseem pretty innocuous and okay
to have, but, for example, theycan also include personal
information such as gender,sexuality, religion, political
affiliation, etc.
Much of this information isinformation that we don't really
want to be spread across theworldwide web and be available
(04:06):
to any website that we browseupon.
We may not want people to knowthese things, right?
I know that I don't feel likethat's absolutely necessary for
other websites to know that I'ma female and my approximately my
age and where I'm located andthings like that.
It's kind of a privacy issue,right?
So the move forward to trackingdown on third party cookies in
(04:29):
the long run is better for usfor all of us, really.
A lot of business owners arewondering, though is this going
to affect Google Analytics?
And the good news is it doesnot.
Google Analytics is considereda first party cookie, and it
helps you track how the usersinteract with your site, and it
(04:50):
doesn't give you information onhow they've interacted on other
websites in general, as long asyou haven't done their old
advanced stuff, that's the first.
Google Analytics is generally afirst party cookie, the way I
see people use it, so the keyhere is that a first-party
cookie is just data related tothe one site you're on, and it's
not passing this data off intoother websites.
(05:11):
So first-party cookies are alsohandy because they can keep
your shopping cart stored inyour browser.
I'm sure you've started ashopping cart and order and gone
to another website.
You got distracted or a kid wasscreaming or somebody rang the
doorbell and you left yourcomputer, forgot about it for
hours and came back and yourshopping cart was still there.
That's the use of a third-partycookie or, sorry, a first-party
(05:34):
cookie.
So that is a first-party cookiekeeping the information about
your activity on that website,which can be very handy,
obviously, because they didn'tlose the things in your shopping
cart.
They can also store things likelogin information and other key
components that make your userexperience better when shopping
online on that website.
(05:55):
So, in short, the doing away of30-party cookies is a great
start to better online privacyand will minimally affect most
business owners.
So you can rest easier knowingthat your online marketing
efforts will likely not need tobe changed outside of normal
regulations to get consent forcookies, depending upon the
(06:15):
country, your website services,your website services.
So I do have to do a little notehere that I am not an attorney
and therefore anything thatyou've heard on this podcast
episode or any of our episodesreally is not given as legal
advice when it comes to privacylaws or anything else like that.
What we're trying to do is tobreak down the tech for you
(06:37):
around the speak of third partycookies, particularly for this
episode, so you can use yourbest judgment and get an
attorney's advice if you feellike you need to.
If you feel like you're in thesituation of third-party cookies
or you want to make sure you'reusing first-party cookies
correctly, I would advise you toget the help of a lawyer who
knows your country's standardsand regulations.
(06:58):
All right, so that's it forthis week's episode of the
e-commerce made easy podcast.
If you're watching on ourYouTube channel or listening on
your favorite podcast app, besure to hit that subscribe
button so you don't miss out onany future upcoming episodes.
And, as always, we appreciateyour feedback and your ideas.
A lot of our podcast episodesare questions we get directly
(07:19):
from you, so make sure to dropus an email at podcast at
bcsengineeringcom, or find us onsocial media and drop us a
message.
We would love to hear from youand we will see you next week.
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