Will hospitality face another Google challenge now that the search engine has changed its approach to eliminating third-party cookies?

Having said they would end the use of third-party cookies in the Chrome browser for the past four years, Google has now retracted this plan. Instead they’ve chosen a softer option by putting the onus on the consumer to opt-out.

What’s the change?

Following in the footsteps of Apple’s AppTrackingTransparency (ATT) on its Safari browser, Chrome now lets consumers choose if they wish to allow third-party cookies to track them.

This announcement comes as no surprise since Google has been delaying a change to cookies for several years with no real action taken. Even this new approach won’t change things immediately. However, it does give advertisers more time to prepare for what will inevitably become a near cookieless world. At Cendyn, we’ve been preparing our customers since 2019 for these impending changes to ensure they maximize the use of their CRM and shift towards strategic initiatives to build out their first-party data repository.

While consumers have been able to opt out of third-party cookies on Google Chrome for some time, increasing awareness within the news has caused opt-out figures to rise. Currently, about 40% of Chrome users have opted out of cookie tracking.

What comes post-Cookie?

Third-party cookies on Chrome will probably disappear slowly rather than experience an instant death. Apple opt-in rates fell to between 12 – 40% after it made its third-party Cookie changes. It’s expected that Google Chrome will see the same if not a greater reduction.

We expect that Google is likely to further invest in their platform on driving solutions that are using machine learning for optimization and bidding, AI for automation and large-scale asset creation, and data modeling to improve measurement accuracy.

So hotel and hospitality marketers should continue preparing for a future where privacy is increasingly prioritized and build a strategy that is not reliant on third-party cookies.

What do these changes mean for hotel marketers?

Qualified, first-party data is essential for the travel industry to create targeted and personalized marketing campaigns. These changes to third-party cookies will affect the ability to target look-a-like audiences on third-party channels as we move into a cookieless world.

We suggest hotels consider the following actions:

  1. Invest in growing your first-party audience data.
  2. Qualify and segment your first-party audiences.
  3. Leverage those audiences for win-back and re-engagement campaigns with strategic marketing, providing opportunities for cross-selling.
  4. Bring in new users by creating similar/lookalike audiences from first-party data for prospecting.
  5. Perfect your contextual keyword strategy, go back to basics by creating relevant content that is highly effective.
  6. Lean into Google’s new advertising products, machine learning and AI to fill in the gaps for data loss and loss of cookies. Google prioritizes advertisers who use their newer products.
  7. Diversify your media mix, test out other platforms like Pinterest, an underutilized and untapped market that is great for the travel industry. Cendyn recently ran a campaign on Snapchat using story ads with a return of 10:1.
  8. Target less saturated platforms where you get a better ROI, especially in the travel market. Google is important but it’s not the only platform.

What is the future?

With more platforms moving away from third-party cookies and increased global government regulation protecting individual user privacy – Cendyn has been preparing hoteliers for this shift for some time. Third-party cookies will not disappear overnight, but users are becoming more conscious of tracking data and opting for increased privacy. Therefore hotel and hospitality businesses must adapt to collect and work with first-party owned data for the most effective marketing campaigns.

Watch this space for more insights on Google developments.

About Cendyn

Cendyn is a global hospitality cloud-based technology company that enables hotels to drive revenue, maximize profitability, and create deeper connections with guests through its integrated solutions. Serving hoteliers for nearly 30 years, Cendyn drives commercial success for hotels through its Find, Book, Grow promise: find the right guests; drive them to book direct, and grow loyalty and revenue across the spectrum of digital guest interactions.

Cendyn has over 32,000 customers worldwide in more than 150 countries. The company supports its growing customer base from locations across the globe, including the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Singapore, Bangkok, and India. To find out more, visit cendyn.com.

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