Will cookieless make us better marketers?

Or in aviation terms, can we fly an ILS approach to minimums by hand? More on that in a minute…

Conversations around the end of cookies, tracking and attribution data often center on just that: the data. But what about the work? Will a cookieless future drive us to make better creative choices (and better work)??

I think so. And I hope so. All of us want- even need- our audiences to lean in rather than look away. Without that, nothing happens.

I'll go out on a limb and say it's great creative that causes the lean in, not the personalized data.

What if the GPS goes out?

Let’s take a look at this with an analogy from aviation. I love flying. And as a pilot, there’s an intriguing question my flight instructor has asked that I’ve always enjoyed: “What happens if GPS goes out?”

It’s clearly an edge case, as the system is masterfully designed (24 satellites in 6 orbits so we can always “see” 8 from anywhere around the planet). A flight plan leverages this data by forming a magenta line between a series of points that take you from your departure to your arrival airport. This allows a pilot to take a plane through clouds to within 200’ above a runway, less than a mile out from your destination, all while descending towards the airport at a high rate of speed.

What would happen if somehow that signal went away or was unreliable? My instructor is basically asking, “Can you safely land the plane without a magenta line to follow?”

For a number of years, marketing has leveraged data in powerful ways to drive demand, and ultimately, to drive sales. Following the magenta line, and converting customers to transact via sophisticated targeting can sometimes take a front seat in marketing. Yet it often misses the mark on building radical customer loyalty. The challenge is, without brand loyalty, it’s a vicious cycle of targeting, re-targeting and chasing ever-thinning conversion margins.

Following the magenta line is easy. That’s why I love the autopilot. It takes over the controls so you can focus on what’s coming next. But that doesn’t change the need that we all have to skillfully bring our passengers back down safely if / when the magenta line disappears.

A cookieless world in marketing is like flying without GPS. Sure, we'll still deploy sophisticated marketing tools to personalize customer experiences, but the best ones will fall into the opt-in camp. We need to go back to the fundamentals to spark a great conversation between a brand and their radically loyal customers. And this works best when we reach out on a human level with empathy, curiosity and kindness.

Empathy, curiosity and kindness as pillars to your campaigns

It’s hard work to craft campaigns and brand stories that are built on empathy, curiosity and kindness, but done well, they create genuine business outcomes. And we know them when we see them. We all have brands that engender a visceral response when we think about them. This connection is a sign that a brand has great respect for its customer. And it’s almost always a sign of lifetime value from the customer towards the brand.

Decades before GPS, a sophisticated system existed that allowed pilots to navigate from radio signals. Part of this system, the ILS, is so accurate that it’s still used today on the commercial flights we take into major airports around the world where fog or inclement weather are common.?

Learning to fly an ILS is part of the fundamentals in instrument flying for pilots. Another, more challenging skill is to use the ILS signal for guidance, but to fly it by hand (without the autopilot).

Decades before first party data, another sophisticated system existed: communicating through human centered storytelling. Brand storytelling’s analog in aviation is the ILS. It is one of the core fundamentals in creating a bridge between a brand and its customers.

As we enter this next phase of opt-in marketing, I believe we need to double down on the fundamentals, opening people’s hearts and minds, allowing ideas, and more importantly relationships, to land.

Landing without GPS through great brand storytelling

Landing brand storytelling without the help of targeting data to find your customers is like flying the old system, an ILS, by hand. Your story needs to find your customers. You know your customers, and your brand, really, really well. They're your north star to guide you to tell the right stories that not only land, but build and strengthen lifetime customer relationships.

I love flying a plane with sophisticated avionics. Yet the technology can create a false sense of safety, and worse, might lead someone to fly in conditions beyond their ability. You need to have a relationship with the whole plane and be able to fly and land it by hand, or by instruments.

There truly is nothing like the feeling of grace when a plane does precisely what I ask of it when I control it by hand - like an extension of my body. It keeps me in the joy of flying, the relationship. Getting to where I need to be, the transaction, is a nice by-product.?

I’m excited about the continued evolution of marketing, cookieless, personalization at scale and beyond. It demands that marketing is inherently more tuned in, more creative and more strategic. Better brand stories will follow. So will customers.

Up Next: How to avoid flying blind (an IFR rating for marketers?)