From Data to Deals: Using First-Party Insights to Accelerate ROI

Focusing on first-party data provides a direct line into understanding customer preferences, behaviors and purchase intent – enabling more effective and personalized marketing campaigns.

Key Takeaways

• With 69% of adults concerned over data privacy, the value in third-party cookies and trackers are losing value among marketers and their clients
• A first-party data strategy, when carefully crafted and developed, provides marketers and their clients with valuable insights into the audience and much more granular data than cookies offer.
• While a first-party data strategy can present significant hurdles, working with a trusted partner can ensure success.

First-Party Data: What to Know ...

After several years of discussion and debate, Google announced in 2024 that the company would not depreciate third-party cookies as planned. Despite the decision, consumers continue to move away from cookies with a study finding 67 percent of adults would turn off these trackers to better protect their online privacy. While Google may still support third-party cookies,

companies looking to advertise and reach their audience need better solutions and data that allow them to truly understand what consumers need and how their buying habits are changing. In addition, regulations such as the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation and the California Consumer Privacy Act show that consumers are even more concerned with sharing personal

information, which underscores the need to move away from third-party trackers.

The result is clear: First-party data is the only sure-fire way to move forward.

“The 3rd party cookie conversation has been circulating for a while now. As users in the US become more concerned with privacy, the time has already passed for publishers to find ways to leverage their 1st party data. While Google keeps moving the goal posts on 3p cookie deprecation, it’s important for publishers, especially B2B publishers, to position themselves now to address the growing advertiser need for audience targeting.” said Ben Baxter, Director of Digital Advertising Operations.

Focusing on the first-party data provides clients with a direct line into understanding customer preferences, behaviors and purchase intent – enabling more effective and personalized marketing campaigns. Tapping into this rich data is a more sustainable way to grow business in the modern digital age.

A successful first-party data strategy then offers advertisers and clients:

• Empowerment to anticipate customer needs;
• Proven methods to tailor specific offerings or services to a targeted audience; and
• The ability to drive greater business value.

Building a first-party data strategy, however, requires understanding data collection methods, the ability to measure data quality and how best to deploy data enhancement techniques.

Key Steps in Building a First-Party Data Strategy

Developing a robust first-party data strategy requires a meticulous approach, encompassing careful planning, ethical data collection and ongoing maintenance. 

The first step that an advertiser or client needs to consider is defining clear objectives. Some basic questions to consider:

• What specific business goals does the company aim to achieve with its first-party data?
• Can this program improve targeting accuracy, personalizing customer experiences or driving conversions?

By answering these questions, a client can guide the entire data strategy.

Next, clients and advertisers must identify the key data points needed to achieve those objectives such as customer attributes, behaviors and preferences.

At Law.com, the team collects a variety of first-party data, including demographic information, job titles, company details and content consumption patterns, to power its targeted advertising solutions. This targeted approach allows the sales team to connect the company’s advertisers with the most relevant audience segments.

Marketers must also consider ethical and transparent data collection practices that assist in building trust and maintaining compliance. Transparency also fosters trust and encourages customers to share data including preferences and interests. Obtaining explicit consent is crucial, ensuring that customers are fully informed and in control of their data.

Data quality is also essential for the effectiveness of any first-party data strategy. Accurate, complete and up-to-date data is essential for generating reliable insights and driving impactful marketing campaigns. For marketers building a first-party data program, essentials include:

• Implementing data validation processes
• Regularly cleansing the data to remove duplicates and inaccuracies
• Establishing ongoing data maintenance procedures that are crucial for ensuring data integrity

Finally, integrating data from various sources into a unified view is vital for maximizing the value of first-party data. A Customer Data Platform (CDP) plays a crucial part, connecting data silos and creating a single source of truth for customer information. This centralized view enables businesses to gain a holistic understanding of their customers and personalize their marketing efforts across all touchpoints.

“Partnering with a dedicated CDP will enhance your ability as a publisher to provide actionable, targetable audiences for your clients. The trends in the market have shifted to an audience-focused approach for advertisers,” Baxter said.

What Data is Available to Marketers and Clients

While Google is still allowing the use of third-party cookies, there are multiple data types available to marketers and their clients that provide insight into the audience. These types include:

1. First-party data: The gold standard, which is collected directly from a company’s audience through various touch points such as website interactions, CRM systems, email subscriptions and app usage.
2. Second-party data: Is another company’s first-party data that is shared through a partnership agreement. This data can supplement a company’s first- party data, offering access to a wider audience and potentially enriching existing customer profiles.
3. Third-party data: Is aggregated from various sources across the web and often purchased from data aggregators. While third-party data can provide broad reach and scale, it comes with limitations.
4. Zero-party data: Is a relatively new offering. This is data is intentionally and proactively shared by customers and often preferences, interests and communication preferences, providing valuable insights for personalized marketing efforts.

How Best to Leverage First-Part Data

Once established, a first-party data program can enhance marketing performance by enabling precise targeting and personalized messaging.

By leveraging data collected directly from customers, marketers gain a much greater and more granular understanding of individual preferences, behaviors and purchase intent. This allows marketers to segment audiences effectively, tailoring campaigns to specific demographics, interests and stages in the buying cycle.

“Law.com has positioned itself well to help make the transition to a cookieless future. By leveraging our subscription database for 1st party data, we have been able to categorize our audience into desirable, scalable targets for our advertisers,” Law.com’s Baxter noted. This enhanced targeting accuracy translates directly into improved campaign effectiveness and return on investment. First-party data also facilitates the creation of personalized messages that resonate with individual customers, fostering stronger engagement and brand loyalty.

“Along with our first party capabilities, we have layered an intent-based approach as well. This has lead to much higher engagement rates for our clients, compared to general brand or taxonomy based targeting,” Baxter added.

How to Overcome Cookies and Other Hurdles

While a first-part data strategy has numerous benefits, there are challenges as well.

One significant hurdle is the complexity of data management. Collecting, organizing and activating first-party data from various sources requires robust technology and expertise.

Marketers must invest in appropriate data management solutions, such as Customer Data Platforms (CDPs), and develop the internal capabilities to effectively utilize these tools.

Another challenge lies in maintaining data quality. Ensuring data accuracy, completeness and consistency is crucial for generating reliable insights and driving successful marketing campaigns. Regular data cleansing and validation processes are essential for maintaining data integrity and minimizing errors.

The deprecation of third-party cookies has added another layer of complexity to the data landscape. As browsers restrict the use of these tracking mechanisms, marketers are losing valuable insights into user behavior across the web. This shift necessitates a fundamental change in how businesses approach audience targeting and measurement. First-party data becomes even more critical in this cookieless future, providing a direct link to understanding customer preferences and behaviors.

Maximizing the value of first-party data requires implementing alternative targeting solutions, such as contextual advertising, cohort analysis and privacy-preserving technologies like differential privacy. Businesses must also adapt their measurement strategies, focusing on metrics that are not reliant on third-party cookies, such as on-site engagement, conversions and customer lifetime value.

“The future is now, when it comes to cookie deprecation,” Baxter said. “While we might not get to a truly cookieless environment, we will see the need for 1st party audience and cookieless solutions become a necessity with publishers. Aligning with CDP and Intent-Based partners should be on the road map for any publisher to help meet the needs of their clients, and provide maximum performance for their advertising initiatives.”

Embracing the Future of Data-Driven Marketing

In the rapidly evolving digital marketing landscape – driven by increasing privacy regulations and the demise of third-party cookies, first-party data has emerged as the cornerstone of successful marketing strategies.

First-party data now plays a critical role in enabling businesses to build direct relationships with their customers, gain valuable insights into their preferences and behaviors and deliver personalized experiences that drive engagement and loyalty. By owning and controlling their data, businesses can navigate the challenges of the cookieless future and create a sustainable foundation for growth.

A robust first-party data strategy is multifaceted, ranging from improved targeting accuracy and campaign effectiveness to enhanced customer experiences and increased return on investment, and offers significant value and return on investment for marketers willing to develop and deploy a proper strategy.