The clock is ticking as the end of third-party data is near. Safari and Firefox have eliminated third-party cookies and Google Chrome is not far behind. Below are three steps marketers can take to address the changing cookie landscape:

Create moments that matter by providing a digital experience that convinces consumers to participate.

With the demise of third-party cookies, customer data is growing more valuable by the minute. Soon, it will be necessary for marketers to develop unique strategies to keep consumers engaged. Strategies have to focus on encouraging customers to participate in a two-way dialogue, authenticate on digital properties and opt-in to data collection and analytics. Marketers can achieve this through creative promotion strategies that provide rewards for either participating or providing personal information.

However, creative strategies alone will not carry marketers forward. They will also have to apply a customer journey management process to the first-party data they do have. This includes:

• Journey analytics: Helping marketers understand the paths customers take in their journeys.
• Embedding analytics: Incorporating artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning into the customer experience to create personalized options based on each customer's journey.
• Rigorous testing methodology: Ensure that analytical assumptions are correct.

Only when creativity and analytics coexist can marketers optimize customer journeys by meeting them in-real time with communication and content that provide demonstrable value.

Embrace data-driven attribution by using analytics, machine learning and AI to make decisions based on logic and/or business rules.

Pressure is rising on chief marketing officers to accelerate growth and revenue, but few can provide omnichannel attribution. Omnichannel attribution is a marketing strategy that highlights how each touchpoint facilitated a conversion. Losing third-party cookie data will make this process more difficult and force marketers to re-think how they measure success. Marketers can address this by incorporating data-driven algorithmic attribution methodology that uses machine learning to identify the touchpoints and sequence of events that form customer journeys, influence customer behavior and result in conversions. To cushion the blow of lost data, attribution methodologies must include online and offline touchpoints, detailed path analytics and an understanding of event sequences and timing between events.

Double down on identity management to facilitate personalization as well as timely and relevant offers.

While it’s becoming increasingly difficult to obtain new customer data, it’s vital to work efficiently with your current customer data. Focusing on identity management means consolidating digital interactions at a customer level, synchronizing online and offline customer data and linking known and unknown digital activity across all your properties and apps.

As a result, you can harness your data to enhance insights, provide more personalization and improve customer decisioning. In addition, identity management services take center stage with dynamic digital data capture, customer-level data granularity, customizable data collection events, real-time customer profile updates, easily deployable identity management capabilities and analytics-ready data. These should combine to help you pinpoint individual visitors and their activities across a range of channels and devices to improve personalization across the entire digital ecosystem.

Marketing for Tomorrow’s Customers explains these strategies and other innovative approaches you’ll need to get ahead of the changes reshaping marketing and the customer experience.