CMOs say the end of third-party cookies is both a major challenge and a good thing

The majority of CMOs say losing third-party cookies poses a major challenge, but will be a positive development, according to a new survey.

Some 72% of CMOs say it will be difficult to handle the impending “cookiepocalypse,” according to Relay42’s report “Rethinking Digital Marketing in a Post-Cookie Era.” However, 61% also say it will wind up being a good thing for business.

Why we care. If Google sticks to its schedule, it will end Chrome’s ability to use third-party cookies in October of next year. This means inventing whole new ways to do digital marketing. Time is running out and the stakes couldn’t be higher.

Dig deeper: Gartner: Give up on the complete view of the customer

“Setting aside the CDP lens, perhaps the most dominant impression is uncertainty. Other than Google Analytics 4 at 45%, no advertising solution to the deprecation of third-party cookies is used by more than 38% of respondents or fewer than 26%. This narrow range shows no single clear path forward has emerged,” David Raab, founder and CEO of the Customer Data Platform Institute, said in the report.

Seeing the customer. Only 22% of respondents said their tech provides advanced capability in providing a single customer view. Almost half (46%) said their capability to do this was either basic or non-existent.

Methodology. The report is based on a survey of 319 senior marketers working for companies with at least $10m in annual revenue, carried out in March and April 2023. Around two-thirds of companies surveyed have annual revenues of at least $100 million, and just under a third have revenues of at least $1 billion. The vast majority of respondents are from the UK (40%) or the US (39%). The best-represented business sectors are retail (33%) and financial services (19%). 

Find the report summarized here.