Executive Summary

Digital media—and especially programmatic methods of transacting—have brought never-before-seen levels of targeting to advertising. After years of threats to marketers’ standard operating procedures, a new targeting landscape is slowly but surely emerging.

How will digital ad targeting practices be affected by the extended identity crisis?

It’s already become more difficult to identify and target users across channels thanks to the absence of third-party cookies in many browsers plus Apple’s restrictions on in-app tracking. These challenges will grow and force advertisers to rely more on a combination of publisher first-party data about their users and alternative targeting tactics like contextual or cohort-based options.

What other trends are affecting how advertisers can reach consumers with paid messages?

More connected TV (CTV) video inventory is becoming available, and via programmatic channels that allow for better targeting than linear TV afforded. Publishers are doing more to get value out of their first-party audience data. And more companies including retailers are realizing they can monetize this type of data by selling ads. It adds up to a rich landscape of addressable options that makes cookies less important even as their death has been delayed.

What are the best practices advertisers and their partners should follow to manage these changes?

The first step is figuring out a strategy—and that means more than just hoovering up all the first-party customer data on offer. Advertisers must consider data collection and use from a fundamental ethical perspective and decide what practices are appropriate. Choices about what to test and learn will flow from there.

WHAT’S IN THIS REPORT? This report discusses the market for targeted digital advertising—primarily focused on programmatic digital display—and how trends including cookie deprecation and AppTrackingTransparency will force changes to how advertisers and their partners approach identifying and targeting audiences.

KEY STAT: The US programmatic digital display ad market will pass the $100-billion mark by 2022, as third-party cookie deprecation looms closer.