With third-party cookie deprecation in Chrome starting subsequent yr (so says Google, a minimum of), patrons are lastly constructing frameworks to check the Privateness Sandbox APIs.
Higher late than by no means.
With help from Google, WPP-owned GroupM introduced a brand new initiative on Wednesday to combine Privateness Sandbox assessments into the media plans of choose purchasers over the approaching yr. Testing will concentrate on three Sandbox APIs: Matters, Protected Audiences and attribution.
GroupM is billing this as a “first-to-market” initiative.
Purchase-side adoption of the Privateness Sandbox has been sluggish thus far, however GroupM hopes the partnership with Google will spur extra testing. Though the partnership isn’t unique, GroupM says it’s the solely company Google can be offering this service to for an undisclosed time period.
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With the cookie deprecation deadline bearing down, nevertheless, isn’t it a bit late to only be getting began? Privateness Sandbox testing has been accessible for months.
However don’t blame patrons for being late to the get together.
Whereas it’s been attainable to run small assessments up up to now – which GroupM has performed – true reside testing will solely be attainable as soon as Google deprecates third-party cookies for 1% of Chrome customers beginning in Q1 2024, mentioned Richard Mooney, Privateness Sandbox workstream lead at GroupM.
The company is constructing its testing framework now to make sure it might probably hit the bottom operating as soon as the primary section of cookie deprecation is underway.
The initiative will check advert buys carried out via Google’s platform, in addition to DSPs, SSPs and publishers which can be built-in with the Privateness Sandbox APIs, Mooney mentioned. The purpose is to check Privateness Sandbox marketing campaign efficiency to campaigns that use third-party cookies and various IDs.
GroupM will select an preliminary group of purchasers which have been proactive about testing and whose marketing campaign targets match inside the testing framework. These purchasers will primarily be drawn from the US, UK, Germany, India and Australia markets, with the purpose of constructing a various testing pool throughout totally different verticals.
After the framework is constructed and baseline efficiency is established, GroupM will lengthen the service to its wider shopper base. Any shopper collaborating in this system may have entry to insights drawn from different shopper assessments, Mooney mentioned.
GroupM declined to call any collaborating purchasers presently.
The GroupM program is “a part of a broader set of efforts” on Google’s half to help Privateness Sandbox testing, a Google spokesperson advised AdExchanger. Nevertheless, they declined to say whether or not Google will launch related efforts with different company companions earlier than it turns off cookies for 1% of Chrome visitors in January.
An additional layer of help
GroupM sees the initiative as addressing two key areas to drive adoption: working with advert tech companions to determine how they’re integrating Privateness Sandbox instruments, and dealing with GroupM purchasers to establish the place Privateness Sandbox testing matches into subsequent yr’s marketing campaign targets.
Purchasers chosen for this system will obtain help from GroupM personnel throughout its knowledge and tech, analytics and activation items. GroupM’s Chrome Privateness Sandbox staff will work with a shopper’s present planning and shopping for groups to establish areas of its 2024 media plan that may very well be used for testing.
For instance, GroupM may suggest that an advertiser dedicate a portion of its Q1 model raise funds to the Privateness Sandbox to check how branding campaigns carry out utilizing the brand new APIs.
Program contributors will even obtain extra help from Google that goes past merely answering the telephone for tech help calls, Mooney mentioned.
Because the testing is in its earliest levels, GroupM just isn’t ready to share any findings but. However the company plans to report findings from the testing course of quarterly, beginning on the finish of Q1 2024.
The UK’s Competitors and Markets Authority (CMA), which has oversight of the Privateness Sandbox, has requested for suggestions from the promoting business as stakeholders begin testing the APIs. The CMA has mentioned it is not going to enable Google to start deprecating third-party cookies as deliberate subsequent yr if it fails to persuade the regulator that its Sandbox options aren’t anti-competitive.
Facilitating Q1 testing for CMA suggestions is among the primary causes for the GroupM partnership, in response to Google.
Mooney declined to specify what findings may come up throughout GroupM’s testing that might increase anticompetitive pink flags for patrons. However he mentioned he imagines the CMA can be watching GroupM’s quarterly testing studies intently.
