Google announced earlier this month that it would not create or use alternative identifiers to track users for advertising purposes. Still, the internet giant reiterated that its advertising will be powered by one of its “Privacy Sandbox” programmes, known as the Federation Alliance (FLoC).
FLoC aims to end the use of third-party cookies in the Chrome browser. It is a new solution from Google to improve the privacy of its users without harming advertisers who use personalised ads through the website.
What is FLoC?
Google has been developing FLoC to remove third-party cookies. This new alternative provides a privacy protection mechanism for interest-based ad targeting.
FLoC-based cohorts are expected to be tested with advertisers starting in the second quarter of this year, with the arrival of Chrome 98. Google stated: “Our testing of FLoC for in-market and relevant Google audiences shows that advertisers can expect to see conversions for at least $95 per dollar compared to cookie-based ads.
Third-party cookies
While the function of cookies was originally designed to enhance users’ internet browsing experience, over time, they have accumulated a large amount of personal data and information related to these users (browsing and online consumption habits, demographics, IP address, websites visited and time of visit, etc.).
Over time, these third-party cookies started to be seen as a user privacy issue. To correct this privacy violation, there are both public measures such as general laws and regulations, such as the RGPD content on cookies, and private measures, such as the automatic blocking of third-party cookies implemented by Safari and Firefox.
FLoC: A solution for user privacy
As users move around the web, their browser uses the FLoC algorithm to calculate their “interest groups”, which is the same for thousands of browsers with similar recent browsing history.
The browser periodically recalculates its cohorts on the user’s device without sharing separate browsing data with the browser provider or anyone else.
Advertisers (websites that pay for ads) can insert code into their websites to collect cohort data and provide it to their adtech platforms (companies that provide adware and tools).
Then, when a browser in one of these cohorts requests a page from a website that displays an ad, the ad platform can use this data to select relevant ads.
FLoC’s objectives
The company aims to replace third-party cookies with FLoC, which is a tool that companies can use to ensure that advertisers continue to create personalised campaigns and ads, while at the same time ensuring users’ digital privacy.
The objectives of FLoC are:
- Ensure better and greater privacy for users in the Chrome browser.
- Replace third-party cookies with the new FLoC system, developed by Google.
- Allow advertisers to continue to personalise ads and target specific groups of users with the same interests.
- Ensure that online advertising investments can still be measured and conversions achieved.
- Implement a trade-off between privacy and advertising so that more intrusive technologies, such as browser fingerprinting, are not used.
How to prepare for the new change?
While there is much uncertainty surrounding Google’s replacement of third-party cookies, there are still ways to allow companies to safely and legally collect data for their activities.
Collecting your own data
Compiling and maintaining own data allows the company to create customer lists to help them market directly to these customers or create lookalike audiences.
Communicating changes to the customer
As with any major change, workflow can be affected, leading to inefficiencies and/or wasteful spending.
A simple overview of the change can help your employees prepare for the change and help you reconsider your customers’ expectations.
Keep up to date with the latest developments
Google, the internet giant, plans to conduct several tests on this new positioning method. The findings of these experiments can provide a basis for its final realisation.
For this reason, it is important to keep up to date on how FLoC is developing and how to get rid of third party cookies.