The Death of the Cookie May be Delayed: Prepare Your Marketing Strategy Before it Goes Away for Good

Influencer marketing and google cookies

The cookie has long been a tool for marketers to use to gather valuable information about their website visitors, enabling them not only to collect data about who they are but also to enable the creation of highly effective marketing campaigns. That is about to change.

The death of the cookie is approaching, with Google stating that it would phase out the use of third-party cookies on its widely popular Chrome browsers in 2022. Marketers now have a small additional amount of time to make some changes thanks to a recent update from Google that it will delay the death of 3rd party cookies until 2024.

Although that might seem like a lot of time, there’s no time like the present to start revamping your marketing strategy for when it inevitably happens. 

Why Is Google Doing Away with the Cookie?

Cookies have been critical to marketing teams and have been a core component of many digital marketing ecosystems related to retargeting.

A survey by The Drum found mixed opinions on the use of cookies, with about 50% of individuals stating they accept all cookies and just 13% of consumers stating they understood what cookies are. Google’s plan to eliminate the third party cookie was in part due to growing consumer concern about privacy and advancing regulatory restrictions.

Regardless of why and when the elimination of third-party cookies is coming, the question remains: What will your business do without this easy access to consumer insights? 

Once cookies are eliminated from Chrome, site retargeting becomes less effective. As Google notes, it’s no longer a good, long-term investment. The move by Google isn’t unexpected, thanks to the GDPR ruling in the European Union.

Adjusting Marketing Strategies Is Essential

Data provided to HubSpot from GetApp found that 41% of marketers believe the death of the cookie will result in their inability to track data properly, and many report they will need to increase their marketing budget to achieve their goals. There is no doubt that the eventual loss of retargeting will make it harder for brands to track user behavior for the purpose of marketing.

Before this happens, it is critical for brands to adjust their marketing strategy to ensure they can continue to draw in highly targeted, ready-to-buy customers. 

Here are a few things marketers need to keep in mind.

First-party Cookies Are Still Viable

The use of first-party cookies will remain in place, allowing websites to track how visitors to their site interact with it. Marketers typically use this information to learn how to better connect with their audience. These cookies can also save user information, such as passwords and carts, allowing visitors to pick up where they left off. For basic website analytics, first-party cookies are still a useful tool.

Privacy Sandbox

Google’s replacement for third-party cookies is called Privacy Sandbox, a tool that blocks invasive tracking techniques. Instead, it uses more collaborative initiatives. This tool would allow all data to remain within the browser instead of in the hands of ad agencies. Google believes this would create a shift to help provide a way for consumers to control privacy but still allow for a way for them to receive personalized ads.

Federated Learning of Cohorts (FloC) is another term you’ll likely hear. Google states that this technology will collect data from users, organize it into groups, and then share that information with advertising companies. This allows Google to maintain control over the data. The jury is still out on just how beneficial and accessible this will be and how marketers could be impacted.

Regardless if your organization uses these tools or goes a different route, now is the time to start working on a plan to overcome those challenges.

Can Influencer Marketing Provide a Way for Brands to Stay Relevant, Seen, and Top-of-Mind During These Changes?

One highly viable alternative to display retargeting and site retargeting is the use of influencer marketing. Organizations are recognizing the value of investing in influencer marketing, and for good reason. 

One of the core reasons for this is because, simply, it works. Business Insider Intelligence reports that the industry will be worth $15 billion by the end of 2022. The key here is that big business is investing for several core reasons:

  • Influencer marketing aids in building trust and credibility in a product, service, or brand. If the influencer is someone a consumer trusts, they are going to listen to their recommendations and take action.
  • Influencer marketing drives conversions. With a high engagement rate, this type of marketing does not rely on retargeting to encourage another visit. Instead, it creates an opportunity for a consumer to click and buy.
  • People go to influencers for advice on buying decisions. One survey found that 86% of women turn to social media specifically in an effort to gather insight before they make a purchase.

Perhaps nothing is more important to recognize that the ROI that comes from influencer marketing, which is far better than most other forms of digital marketing. One survey found that for every dollar a company spends on influencers, they earn $5.78, and sometimes as much as $18, in revenue.

What to Do Now as a Marketer

The Death of 3rd party cookie advertising is something to worry about as a marketer. However, the use of other tools, including the use of influencer marketing, could provide a strategy to enable businesses not just to keep their marketing leads coming in but to potentially even improve outcomes. Influencer marketing doesn’t put consumer data at risk, which means it’s not likely to be scrutinized down the road. Put simply, it’s also effective.

Did Your Influencer Marketing Campaign Fail to Deliver Results? Here’s Why

Can you believe it?

After all that time and effort put into your influencer marketing campaign, it fails to deliver the desired results.

And you’re left wondering just what went wrong.

Sometimes, the stars just don’t align, of course.

But other times, it comes down to a misstep (or two!) that ends up costing you big.

Fortunately, you can dig into your campaign to see where you went astray and correct your course for huge future successes.

Ready to get started? Here’s a look at several reasons why influencer marketing campaigns fail to deliver results.

A Focus on Follower Numbers Above All Else

Which one is better?

Mega influencers have millions of followers while nano influencers have fewer than 1,000.

If you answered, “The more the merrier,” you might have been barking up the wrong tree. When it comes to influencer marketing campaigns, you have to value quality over quantity.

Although your influencer should have a large enough audience to make your efforts worthwhile, it’s important to find someone with followers who have an interest in your products and services. Similarly, it’s critical to find influencers (and thus, audiences) who align with your brand values, goals,and mission. 

For that reason, the answer typically lies somewhere in the middle, especially if you have a relatively niche target audience.

If you go the 1,000 to 100,000 follower micro-influencer route, for example, you get the best of both worlds – a relatively large audience with a potential direct interest in your brand offerings.

Plus, by going that route, you get your pick of top-notch social marketing partners. Nearly 50% of all influencers have between 5,000 and 20,000 followers, after all, allowing you plenty of room to select the very best person for the job, without sacrificing your brand values.

The Influencer Doesn’t Take the Right Approach

Influencers infuse your marketing approach with the human element, combining word of mouth marketing and social proof. But that only works when the recommendations come from a truly authentic place.

At the end of the day, you need an influencer who’s passionate about your brand offerings and thrilled to tell the world about it.

If they simply read from the script without putting any heart into it, their efforts will flop, and audiences will notice. Guaranteed.

To get that level of commitment from your next influencer, you must invest time searching for a partner with a passion for products and services like yours. They shouldn’t just take whatever marketing campaigns come their way, either.

Search for a marketing partner who’s highly selective about what they promote, so all their messages come across as genuine recommendations.

When you do find the right ambassador for your brand, collaborate with them while creating the campaigns. They know their audience best, after all, so let them guide you on how to speak to their needs in a meaningful way.

True Collaboration Flops Due to Poor Incentives

Passion is great, but influencers aren’t in this game for free. You need to offer the right type of incentives at a rate that makes sense for the effort put into running your campaigns. Otherwise, forget it. 

There are two main ways to incentivize your influencers to become an effective brand ambassador: commission and pay-per-post. There’s no one right answer on which one to choose either.

With commission, you minimize your risk by only paying when your influencers get results. On the other hand, experienced influencers might not want to work for free if your campaigns fail to resonate with their audience.

On the other hand, pay-per-post sponsorships encourage influencers to eagerly get the word out about your products and services, but you have to pay whether or not they get results.

You have to balance your company’s needs with the influencer’s, so think deeply about what you both want out of the equation. As we’ve said many times before, the best campaigns create winning scenarios for the brand, the influencer, and the end consumer. 

Failure to Follow the Rules Lands You in Hot Water

As influencers make claims about your products and services, it’s quite easy for them to land on the wrong side of social media policies, especially when some of those policies are constantly evolving. 

And when that happens, it’s all over – and you could end up in seriously hot water as a result.

Depending on your location and industry, you might have to pay close attention to FDA regulations, consumer protection laws, and other restrictions.

The rules of your social media platform of choice come into play, too. If you or your marketing agency fail to keep all these things in mind while creating your campaigns, you can kiss your marketing results goodbye.

Your influencer could end up in trouble as well, resulting in the cancellation of their account and other serious repercussions. No one wants that.

So, to keep everyone safe from the fallout, you must practice your due diligence in understanding what you can – and cannot – say. Then, instruct your influencer on what to avoid saying to keep the campaign on the right track always.

The Strategy Ended When Promos Went Live

Once you’ve found the perfect influencer, and your campaigns go live on social media, you may be tempted to think the work is all done. That’s a novice mistake!

Sure, your campaign may be getting a ton of views on social media, and maybe even some flow-through traffic or sales on your website. But, by stopping there, you miss out on major brand awareness and sales opportunities. 

Any time a social influencer posts something favorable about your brand, you should build as much momentum around that as possible. Share the post on social media, share it with your current and prospective customers, and mention it in your e-mail newsletters. Now is not the time to be shy about self-promotion. 

Ready to Create Successful Influencer Marketing Campaigns? 

The best influencer campaign has all the right people organically talking about your brand to an interested audience.

Easy enough, right? Well, not always. Oftentimes, the potential pitfalls loom too big to overcome on your own. Thankfully, you don’t have to jump into the process alone. Our team is here to help.

At More Influence, we understand just what it takes to build successful influencer marketing campaigns for your brand, and how to build momentum around social campaigns once they’ve launched. Reach out to our team today to see how to get started.

How to Find Amazon Influencer Storefronts in 2022

If you’re trying to establish a rock-solid presence on Amazon, collaborating with Amazon influencers is one of the most effective ways. Recently, we witnessed Amazon launch its own Influencer Program, allowing influencers to launch their dedicated storefronts on the platform. Here’s an example:

Collaborating with these influencers is one of the best ways to increase your sales and grow your Amazon business. And while you may know all about the benefits of Amazon influencer marketing, the only problem is that most third-party sellers find themselves facing a hard time getting started.

The BIG question they find looming in front of them is:

“How to Find Amazon Influencer Storefronts in 2022?”

And if you are wondering the same, allow me to present the three best ways to find Amazon influencer storefronts in 2022.

3 Ways to Find Amazon Influencer Storefronts in 2022

And here you go:

  1. Use the #FoundItOnAmazon Page
  2. Use Hashtags
  3. Use Dedicated Influencer Marketing Platforms

Use the #FoundItOnAmazon Page

Whether you sell home décor products or clothes, you can find Amazon influencers promoting different types of products from different brands on their dedicated storefronts.

And you can directly head over to these storefronts from the #FoundItOnAmazon page. Upon heading there you’ll be able to explore the different categories. And for each of these categories, you’ll find different influencers listed on these storefronts.

Here’s what the page looks like:

Now, let me select “Home Décor.”

Next, I’ll click on the first listing, and here’s what I came across:

Katie is promoting this beautiful white desk. Now, when you click on Katie’s name on the right-hand side, you’ll be able to visit her storefront.

Similarly, you can explore the #FoundItOnAmazon page and look for relevant influencers in your niche with whom you can collaborate .

Use Hashtags

Another way to find Amazon influencers is to look up hashtags like #amazoninfluencer, #founditonamazon, and #amazonambassador. These hashtags are used by Amazon influencers while they’re promoting Amazon storefronts on their social media channels.

We looked up the hashtag #founditonamazon on Instagram and here’s a post from Allie Hunter who has her own dedicated storefront on Amazon:

Use Dedicated Influencer Marketing Platforms

Another great way to find Amazon influencers is to use Amazon influencer marketing platforms like Grin, Klear, CreatorIQ, and many more. Using these platforms you can find and connect with popular Amazon influencers in your niche.

These platforms will help you tap into their wide database, allowing you to save a huge amount of time and money. At the same time, these platforms allow businesses to verify these influencers’ credibility and metrics such as engagement rates and reach.

Conclusion

Amazon influencer marketing is powerful. It’s a great way for Amazon third-party sellers to maximize their reach and put their Amazon business on hyper-growth mode.

So, if you have been struggling with your sales on Amazon and would like to tap into the power of Amazon influencer marketing, you can use one of the three above-mentioned tactics to find the right Amazon influencer fit. We do know that this process can be a little daunting, so if you’d like to leave it up to the experts, feel free to contact us and we can help you through the process!

Read More:

Why Should eCommerce Businesses Tap into the Power of Influencer Marketing?

The eCommerce industry is growing exponentially.

Data fetched from Statista indicates that 2021  global retail eCommerce sales stood at a staggering $4.9 trillion. And you’ll probably be shocked to learn that this number has been predicted to reach $7.3 trillion by the end of 2025.

While we’re witnessing an ever-increasing number of people purchasing products online, there’s just one big problem. In the past few years, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic, we saw more and more sellers launch their eCommerce stores – which has resulted in incredibly fierce competition.

More than 24 million eCommerce stores exist on the internet, with more and more being launched every single day. Since you’re reading this article, we’re assuming that you’ve already launched your store or are planning to do so. Whether you’re a third-party Amazon seller or have built your own eCommerce store from the ground up, chances are that you may be struggling with your sales, at least in the initial phases.

In today’s crowded market, if you want to break through the noise and put your eCommerce store on hyper-growth mode, we’d advise you to tap into the power of influencer iarketing.

Why?

Allow us to help you navigate through the realm of eCommerce influencer marketing.

Throughout this blog post, we’ll look at the four big reasons eComm businesses should use influencer marketing to maximize their reach and grow their business.

4 BIG Reasons eComm Businesses Should Incorporate
Influencer Marketing into their Overall Marketing Strategy

Following are the four points we’ll be shedding light on:

  • Helps Build Trust
  • Allows eCommerce Businesses to Tap into Influencers’ Years of Hard Work & Massive Fan Following
  • Helps Increase Brand Awareness & Expand Your Reach
  • Helps Increase Sales

Helps Build Trust

 Trust is scarce these days.

And if you’ve recently launched your eCommerce store and don’t really have a rock-solid online presence, then your audience may find it difficult to trust you.

No matter how hard you try your target audience will face a tough time trusting you until they see someone, who’s not a part of your brand, endorsing your product(s).

That’s where influencer marketing comes in.

One of the reasons why eComm influencer marketing works is that when an influencer endorses your product(s), their followers know the influencer is independent of your brand.

And when your audience sees someone who isn’t a part of your brand recommending your product(s) to others, you’ll indirectly be positioning yourself as a trustworthy brand.

Whether you’re a third-party Amazon seller or have launched your own eCommerce store from the ground up, collaborating with the right influencers will help you gain the trust of your audience. But remember – it’s just the start of the relationship.

Building trust isn’t a one-day thing. Once you have established the relationship you need to focus on nurturing it by offering the highest-quality products and top-grade service to your customers – which will help you solidify your brand as trustworthy, credible, and authoritative.

Allows eCommerce Businesses to Tap into Influencers’ Years of
Hard Work & Massive Fan Following

While we live in a world where posts can go viral at any given point in time, influencers with thousands, if not millions, of followers have spent hours building their profile, growing their following, and connecting with their audience. Their followers/subscribers trust them – which is why they love interacting with them. And by collaborating with the right influencers, you’ll be tapping into years of their hard work and massive fan following.

But remember – if you want to achieve the best possible results, you need to work with influencers in your niche. If you sell tech gadgets, then there’s no point in collaborating with beauty influencers.

So it’s absolutely imperative that you collaborate with influencers who have the same followers as your target audience. Otherwise, you’ll face an extremely hard time achieving the desired results.

Helps Increase Brand Awareness & Expand Your Reach

When influencers endorse your brand’s products you’ll see an uptick in the number of people hopping onto your website or taking the desired action. And when they purchase your product(s) and are really satisfied with the experience, they’d love nothing more than to recommend your eCommerce store to their friends and family members.

At the same time, running strategic influencer marketing campaigns can help you go viral. By collaborating with the right influencers and building engaging posts you’ll increase the chances of reaching out to as many of your prospects and customers as possible. And if your posts go viral, BOOM – you’ll be on your way to massive growth – which is another one of the plus points of eComm influencer marketing.

Helps Increase Sales

Influencer marketing, when done right, will help you increase your sales like nothing you’d have ever seen before. For every single dollar you invest in influencer marketing, you can expect an average return of $6.85 in revenue. That’s INSANE!

But remember – while collaborating with the right influencers and building high-quality content is important, don’t think of it as the end. If you want to achieve ground-breaking results, you need to think of the big picture.

For instance, what if you are spending thousands of dollars on your influencer marketing campaigns yet your prospects are facing a hard time adding products to their cart? What if they have to wait five to ten seconds before they are fully able to load your website’s pages? Thus, it is critical that you have a mobile-friendly and fully-optimized eCommerce store that delivers a great user experience.

Conclusion

Influencer marketing is powerful, but only if you do it right. At MoreInfluence we have helped and are actively helping dozens of eComm businesses enjoy outstanding returns with our strategic influencer marketing approach.

And we would love nothing more than to help you out.

Don’t wait around!

Allow us to help you grow your eCommerce business today!