This move will reshape the internet, and change how publishers, advertisers, brands and marketers operate.

“View-through attribution, third-party data, DMP and multitouch attribution will be ‘dead’ under the proposals. We’re now facing a world with significantly less measurement and targeting.”

What does this mean? Initial thoughts:

  1. Less audience targeting from 3rd party cookies => more need for audience insights from other data sources. Owned web properties will become more important.
  2. Google’s stranglehold on advertising will tighten, as Chrome will track engagement metrics instead.
  3. Throwing money at supposedly targeted distribution will stop appealing to advertisers, many of whom are already suspicious of the purported ROI of such campaigns.
  4. Digital ads we see will become less obviously personalised to us.
  5. Instead, marketing will need to work on its merits – attracting audiences via sustained campaigns based around creative concepts rather than algorithms.
  6. Yet another revenue source will be cut off for publishers, making it harder than ever to fund traditional journalism.
  7. This will in turn either open up more gaps for niche non-profit publishers (and brands) to fill, or lead to a decline in the amount of content produced.

Interesting times…