Report: 99% marketers struggling with data deprecation thanks to cookie demise, privacy laws

Ninety-nine in 100 marketers are impacted by data deprecation thanks to the demise of cookies and browser tracking restrictions and are looking to better harness zero-party data sets as a result. Yet less than half know how to use such data effectively, a new report has found.

According to the Data Deprecation Challenge and Promise of Zero-Party Data report produced by Forrester resource on behalf of martech company, SheerID, 99 per cent of the 200+ digital marketing decision makers surveyed are being impacted by data deprecation resulting from Safari, Mozilla and Apple iOS restrictions as well as toughening privacy laws and walled gardens. Challenges include acquiring customer data, cross-selling and upselling, tracking customer journeys across channels and touchpoints and creating personalised messaging and experiences.

In response, nine in 10 said their firms are planning to capture more zero-party data within 12 months. Forrester describes zero-party data as that which a customer intentionally and proactively shares with a brand, such as preferences, purchase intentions, personal context and how they want the brand to recognise them.

Yet 42 per cent of respondents said they don’t know how to use the zero-party data they have effectively. Four in 10 claimed to both have such data and to be using it, while 15 per cent said zero-party data access is limited.

Read more: Zero party data: What on earth is it and why do marketers need it?

Top use cases cited for zero-party data utilisation are deriving customer insights and customer intelligence (45 per cent), tracking customer journeys across channels and touchpoints (45 per cent), knowing who our customers are (43 per cent) and creating personalised messages or experiences (43 per cent).

What’s stopping respondents from harnessing zero-party data more effectively are accuracy of the data (36 per cent), potential liability due to new privacy regulations (36 per cent), uncertainty about how zero-party data fits into the organisation’s broader data strategy (34 per cent), uncertainty about how to ask consumers for this data (33 per cent) and uncertainty around third-party technologies that can assist with implementation (33 per cent).

On the list of priority investments to drive zero-party data use are building and enhancing loyalty programs to capture more of this data (66 per cent), third-party technologies to deliver personalised experiences using zero-party data (63 per cent), financial incentives for data provided such as giveaways (59 per cent), third-party technologies to capture zero-party data (53 per cent) and hiring an agency to build a campaign (52 per cent).

And why is zero-party data so important? For most respondents, the significant or transformational benefit is increased customer lifetime value (76 per cent), an ability to profile customers (75 per cent) and improved ability to target customers (75 per cent).

The Forrester derived survey was conducted across 200 digital marketers of management-level or above in the UK, US, France and Germany.

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