While 2021 was far from a return to normal, publishers found ways to adapt, innovate and thrive in a rapidly changing environment. To help you keep your business on track in 2022, we're recapping some of last year's biggest tips and resources from Google Ad Manager.

Prepare for a privacy-first future

Use automation to do more with less

Invest in advanced TV video streaming

Build a retail media business

Learn from other publishers

In this post, we’re sharing top insights from a research report commissioned by Google and published by Deloitte. The report focuses on the evolving ads privacy landscape through the lens of European publishers. We also recently studiedhow publishers in the Americas are turning to first-party data to prepare for the future.

As new privacy regulations emerge, publishers are rethinking their digital ad strategies. To better understand how industry leaders are navigating the shifting landscape and investing in first-party data, Google partnered with Deloitte to speak to 30 publishers and broadcasters across Europe. Today, we’re sharing an overview of what the full report uncovered, including the impact of recent privacy changes on publishers and guidance for a future-proof, privacy-first path forward.

A more private internet

According to industry research, there’s been a steep decline in user trust on the internet — steep enough to spur action. In a recent Ipsos report, 80% of people are concerned about the potential misuse of personal information online, prompting 73% to delete cookies and clear their browsing history and 70% to switch geolocation off when they’re not using it. Regulators and governments around the world are moving online privacy to the top of their agendas, causing leading technology and internet businesses to double down on preparing for a more private web.

Our research also indicates that publishers are generally in support of the new privacy regulations, since it helps them establish a trust-based relationship with customers. But while the industry adjusts to the deprecation of third-party cookies, survey respondents are questioning the impact to open-market programmatic trading.

Lessons from industry leaders

The main lessons in re-strategizing for the new era of online privacy fall into three categories:

Get started on a first-party data journey

Currently, 80% of users give publishers permission to capture and use their information for analytics, marketing and site optimization. But top publishers aren’t looking to gain consent at all costs, especially not at the cost of consumer trust. Instead, they focus on clear communication and transparency about what they’re requesting and why, helping customers make an informed decision.

For 72% of publishers, their biggest worry about using first-party data is privacy legislation. While European privacy compliance efforts are mostly driven at the country level, resulting in varied approaches, a few patterns became apparent during our conversations with publishers. Many publishers are installing better data governance, rolling out privacy-first processes, installing privacy tools or auditing suppliers, among other activities — more can be found on page six of the report.

Build data maturity

Seeing data as a living asset that can be developed through machine learning, as opposed to a static source of insight, is key to achieving data maturity and could help publishers pull ahead. Leaders are also prioritizing access to secure, verified data (often received during the user registration process) and valuable second-party data. Second-party data refers to other organizations’ first-party data bought directly from the source, which can be used to validate an organization’s own first-party data.

Engage with the buy-side

To reach premium cost per thousand (CPMs) and drive higher demand, most publishers create bespoke audiences to trade programmatically, with some publishers achieving results 15 times higher than campaigns without audiences.

Engaging with the buy-side is critical. Many publishers are proactively initiating conversations with agencies and brands, where relevant, to test the impact of third-party cookieless trading on CPM or yield, the effectiveness of their first-party solution and their interest in joint planning for a privacy-centric world. However, publishers feel that parts of the sector aren’t properly preparing for the upcoming privacy changes. This supports recent IAB research, where 40% of marketers claim they aren’t ready.

A privacy-focused future

This is only the beginning of internet regulation, and policies are expected to become even more complex. According to Gartner, 65% of the world will have personal data covered under modern privacy regulation by 2023, up from 10% in 2020.

In light of these regulatory changes, successful publishers are looking for ways to share data across the ecosystem through clean rooms or other privacy-friendly means. Publishers that use first-party and second-party data effectively, and with privacy top of mind, will be able to offer a better, broader set of products to advertisers. This will allow them to invest in content that helps broaden and deepen their relationship with audiences.

To learn more, download the full report or watch the webinar presented by the report’s lead author, Patrick Ugeux, Associate Partner at Deloitte.

In this post, we’re sharing top insights from a research report commissioned by Google and published by Deloitte. The report focuses on how publishers in the Americas are turning to first-party data to prepare for the future. We also recently studiedthe evolving ads privacy landscape through the lens of European publishers.

90% of the North and South American publishers surveyed for our new research believe that online privacy changes are either overdue or coming at the right time. At the same time, as the industry shifts away from third-party cookies to honor people’s increasing preference towards privacy, McKinsey is projecting a meaningful reduction in publishers' collective ad revenues. To offset their potential losses, many of the publishers we spoke with are turning to first-party data because it offers a privacy-forward way to deliver more relevant and engaging ad experiences for their audiences, which are valuable to their advertiser clients.

To help our partners prepare for a privacy-centric future, we worked with Deloitte to interview and survey 35 market-leading publishing, broadcast, e-commerce and telecommunication companies (all referred to here as “publishers”) across the Americas. The findings show how top publishers are prioritizing first-party data to better connect with media buyers and maintain their competitive edge. Below are a few insights from the report.

Setting up for success

80% of the publishers we interviewed claim at least a certain degree of confidence in their ability to source the first-party data they’ll need to thrive in the future. Here’s how they’re doing it.

Grow first-party audiences by adding value

Before gathering first-party data, publishers note that it’s important to get the value exchange right. “We can’t just collect people’s information or say, ‘Come visit our site and sign over your data,’” said one U.S. publisher. “We need to re-legitimize the value exchange and improve the quality of signals gathered from direct interactions with users.”

Creating value starts by delivering the most relevant and compelling content possible for audiences. From there, publishers that have developed strong relationships with their audiences are enticing them to create accounts in exchange for premium content or additional functionality, like sharing, commenting or making purchases.

Manage your audience data more effectively

When discussing how they store user data, several participants mention that they’re turning away from traditional third-party Data Management Platforms (DMPs) and investing in owned and operated Customer Data Platforms (CDPs). “I think that it has almost become a necessity to own the relationship with the customer, own your consumer data platform and own the ways that you connect with third parties,” a U.S. publisher shared.

Our report also uncovered that many publishers are creating first-party identifiers — IDs set by publishers using first-party cookies or users' login data — across their sites or apps. This helps them gain greater insights from each customer touchpoint, and improve the content and ad experience.

Connecting audiences with media buyers

The majority of publishers surveyed are optimistic about how privacy changes will impact their relationships with media buyers. 75% believe these changes will shift power from media buyers to media sellers, who have long, established relationships with people who visit their sites and apps.

According to the report, publishers are activating their first-party data with media buyers in a variety of ways. They’re selling audience segments based on contextual signals in exchanges. They’re creating encrypted identifiers specific to their sites, and using those to reach individuals either through the programmatic auction or direct deals. Some publishers are also using data clean rooms, where both the publisher and advertiser provide identifiers to match a set of users that meet the advertiser’s needs.

But before you activate your data, it’s important to first understand your privacy approach. How publishers sell their inventory in the future will depend on key things like their level of access to first-party data, the sophistication of their data technology and how much they trust a third party with their first-party data.

Achieving results with first-party data

According to the report, 70% of publishers believe that first-party data will provide a significant advantage in the future. Keeping in mind that the benefits of first-party data extend into marketing and management decision-making, the research identified a few ways leading partners are using first-party data to maintain a competitive ads business.

Build more accurate audiences

Most publishers shared that they are focused on using first-party data and machine learning to build audience cohorts based on the content users consume across their sites.

Establish more direct relationships

More than 60% of the players Deloitte surveyed describe a move away from the programmatic auction to more direct forms of trading — like Programmatic Guaranteed — to drive yield.

Discover new sources of revenue

First-party data can serve as the foundation for entirely new businesses — especially for publishers who benefit from an inherent advantage in capturing first-party data, like telcos and commerce players. Some of the examples shared include loyalty programs and even a credit card offering.

Navigating the road ahead, together

The landscapes across both advertising technology and legislation are shifting daily. To help make sense of the changes and take advantage of emerging opportunities, 50% of the publishers surveyed are partnering closely with technology providers. And while many are forming a privacy-first strategy to thrive in today’s market, savvy publishers are building adaptable plans to succeed in tomorrow’s.

These are just a sample of the insights available in our new study. To learn more, download the full report or watch the webinar presented by the report’s lead author, Patrick Ugeux, Associate Partner at Deloitte.

It’s no secret that the digital advertising ecosystem is evolving. And at the center of all that change is user privacy. The way that publishers, advertisers and technology providers handle and activate user data is being reconsidered and reimagined to more effectively protect people’s personal information online.

Web developers and technology providers are leading open-source initiatives like the Privacy Sandbox to address this challenge. But other areas of investment, like first-party data, are largely being driven by publishers and brands who are uniquely positioned to establish and deepen direct relationships with the people who love their content, products or services.

As we’ve shared in the past, we believe first-party data is poised to play an important role in the future of digital advertising. That's why we're launching new features that will make it easier for our publishing partners to maintain direct relationships important to their businesses and scale the use of their first-party data in ways that meet people’s expectations for data protection.

Activating first-party data in the programmatic auction

Today, we are launching new functionality that enables publishers to share Publisher Provided Identifiers (PPIDs) — pseudonymized first-party identifiers that are created and controlled by publishers — with Google’s programmatic demand. By helping publishers expand the use of their first-party identifiers to more transaction types, like the Open Auction, our partners will be able to show ads that are more relevant to their audiences, which will increase the value of their programmatic inventory.

In our initial experiments, we observed that Beta partners experienced an increase of 15% or more in programmatic auction revenue when passing PPIDs in inventory without other identifiers.¹

“By partnering with Google to test PPID for programmatic demand, we’ve seen significant revenue improvements in browsers where third-party cookies are not available. With the wealth of powerful first-party data Hearst Magazines generates in facilitating commerce activity from our sites, we’re excited by this progress and look forward to seeing what solutions Ad Manager builds to help publishers navigate today's privacy environment.”

Scott Both
Vice President of Programmatic Monetization & Operations, Hearst Magazines

"At Pelmorex, finding privacy-first solutions is an important part of our long-term monetization strategy. That's why we recently partnered with Ad Manager to test PPID for programmatic. The ability to bring our own data to the auction offers the potential to increase the value of our programmatic inventory now and in the future when third-party cookies are fully phased out."

Darren Bulakowski
Head of Monetization & Programmatic, Pelmorex Corp, The Weather Network

Before sharing PPIDs with Google demand, Ad Manager turns them into per-publisher partitioned IDs, so users cannot be identified across other publishers’ sites and apps. Then Google Ads and Display & Video 360 aggregate the anonymized data from participating publishers to help build audience segments. Using these segments, advertisers can programmatically deliver relevant ads on publishers’ sites and apps based on first-party data. In addition to helping publishers earn more revenue in the auction, the data also unlocks core functionality for advertisers, like cross-device reach, frequency management, and creative optimization in programmatic inventory without third-party cookies or other identifiers present.

It’s important to note that advertisers using segments built with PPIDs will not have visibility into underlying user data or the IDs themselves, and because PPIDs are unique to each publisher, there is no way to match identifiers or create profiles across sites.

Audience segments created using PPIDs will only be made available in programmatic auctions when there are no other identifiers present. This means that PPIDs will have no impact on publishers’ programmatic inventory where third-party cookies or other identifiers are still provided. Additionally, PPIDs passed to Ad Manager cannot contain personal information or device IDs and Google has no visibility or access to the underlying data.

Supporting publishers’ direct relationships

We understand that publishers often work directly with many third-party buying partners — Authorized Buyers and Open Bidders — across the ecosystem to maximize the value of their inventory. That’s why we’ve long supported these trusted, direct relationships between publishers and buyers, and built solutions to help our partners monetize in the best way for their businesses.

In March, we shared that we are building a new feature to enable publishers to securely share encrypted signals with Authorized Buyers and Open Bidders via Ad Manager. We've since made progress based on feedback from our partners, and in the coming months, we’ll onboard additional Beta partners and increase the functionality to include app and video inventory. We’re also continuing to make workflow improvements in the Ad Manager dashboard, including troubleshooting tools and controls to make it easier for publishers and their partners to use the feature. Our goal is to make encrypted signals available to all publishers and their Authorized Buyer and Open Bidder partners in 2022.

Similar to how PPIDs are used to pass first-party data to Google’s programmatic demand, encrypted signals from publishers will allow publishers to share their data directly with other trusted buyers. Publishers who opt to use this feature will have full control over what data is passed and which bidders receive the signals. Ad Manager will only route the signals on behalf of the publisher and will not be able to read the signals.

Investing in first-party data is a privacy-forward way that publishers can increase the value of their programmatic inventory now and in the future. Given the feedback we’ve heard from partners, we have prioritized this product area and will continue to develop features that empower publishers with the data and identity tools they need to prepare and grow their businesses.

^{1. Google Ad Manager Internal Data, August 2021}