Google's shift on third-party cookies — what marketers need to know

Third-party cookie deprecation has been looming for years. But according to a blog post announcement, Google won’t be deprecating third-party cookies after all. As an alternative Google will introduce a new experience in Chrome that focuses instead on elevating “user choice.”

While there is no longer a communicated end date for third-party cookies in Chrome, their use will likely continue to decrease over time. The scale of third-party cookies will largely depend on how users interact with Chrome’s new user choice feature. Google hasn’t provided many further details, so it’s hard to predict its impact at this point.

It’s important to remember that consumers already spend a significant amount of time in "cookieless" environments. In the 2024 Adobe Cookieless Research Report, respondents stated that almost half of their potential market already resides in cookieless environments (this includes non-Chrome browsers, mobile operating systems and others that don’t allow third-party cookies.

Adobe’s recommended strategy remains consistent. Brands need to think beyond Google's timelines for Chrome and focus on delivering engaging customer experiences across browsers and apps, powered by unified customer profiles. Adobe is uniquely positioned to help with industry-leading solutions for managing audiences, co-ordinating customer journeys and measuring performance — across cookie-based and non-cookie-based environments.

We continue to recommend marketers build first-party data strategies around durable identifiers alongside support for durable third-party data and second-party data collaboration. These tactics are critical for maintaining reach and measurement of customers and prospects.

For now, marketers can continue with the status quo for targeting and measurement in Chrome but should still test investments made in preparation for cookieless environments. Many of the investments made can be applied to Safari and Firefox environments today due to these browsers’ strict data privacy measures.

We expect marketers to lean into the change in Google’s cookie policies to scale their marketing activities. Now more than ever, marketers require a range of capabilities to deliver engaging customer journeys across channels, browsers and ecosystems. Exceptional experiences help win over new customers and retain existing customers and creating these experiences doesn’t require third-party cookies.

Adobe Real-Time CDP helps customers adopt privacy-centric first-party data strategies while also supporting the use of third-party data providers for scaling activation practices. Additionally, Adobe is bringing Real-Time CDP Collaboration to market later this year to help customers deliver exceptional experiences with second-party data.

Adobe Advertising helps advertisers deliver best-in-class performance via cookie-based tactics and durable IDs to add to their advertising strategies. Cookies still play a key role in reach strategies and Adobe supports both cookie and cookieless ecosystems. We will continue investments in our AI-powered algorithms, reach and performance tactics in CTV and enhanced user experiences and usability to navigate the changing landscape of customer acquisition.

Adobe Customer Journey Analytics was purpose-built for customer-level analysis around a unified profile, using first-party cookies, durable IDs and data collected pre- and post-authentication to measure every touchpoint in the customer journey.

Adobe Mix Modeller is an AI-powered marketing measurement and planning tool for helping businesses prove and maximise ROI. With advanced data modelling that brings together aggregate and event-level data with scenario planning, teams can now quickly and efficiently determine where to spend across channels to drive business growth.

As details emerge around the new experience in Chrome, we’ll have a better grasp of the magnitude of the scale decrease based on other informed choice initiatives like Apple’s App Tracking Transparency and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in the EU.

As the head of product marketing for Adobe Advertising, Ian Monaghan works with clients, product and client services to develop strategy and marketing for Adobe's advertising products and integrations with other Adobe Experience Cloud solutions. Prior to joining the team, he was part of the Special Operations team based in Emeryville and the TubeMogul London team for three and a half years as the director of EMEA operations.

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