Trucking Firms Relieved as Google Extends Cookie Use

Cookies make it much easier for companies to better target you with digital advertising. (Nastasic/Getty Images)

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Google has once again backed down from its threat to eliminate third-party cookies from its Chrome browser, triggering sighs of relief from many businesses — including trucking companies — along with inflamed diatribes from privacy advocates.

Employed by ad tech companies to track where you go on the web — and what you do once you get there — cookies have been used since the mid-’90s by truckers and others to create a profile of your internet buying habits.

Those profiles make it much easier for companies to better target you with digital advertising.

The use of cookies “tailors our ads to individuals who are more likely to need our services or are actively looking for a career in trucking,” said Sean Schnipper, director of marketing at Lily Transportation and Transervice Logistics. “This reduces wasted ad spend and increases the likelihood of attracting qualified leads.”

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Dysart 

Such cookies also are important in the company’s search for new truck drivers.

“As we look to recruit new drivers for Lily and Transervice or technicians for Transervice, tracking cookies can help us target specific individuals — such as those who have shown interest in trucking-related content or job boards,” Schnipper said.

For many, Google’s decision to keep cookies alive for the foreseeable future has come as a surprise. For years, Google has been signaling that it would phase out third-party cookies in 2025 due to protests over privacy concerns.

But even so, Google’s decision is not a black-and-white win for third-party cookie fans. Instead, Google indicates it will now try to thread the needle and attempt to please supporters and opponents of cookies.

Google’s specific solution: continue to offer advertisers the option to use third-party cookies while building in new controls for the Google Chrome browser that will make it easy for web surfers to opt out.

Anthony Chavez, a Google vice president specializing in online privacy, said Google plans to introduce a new experience in Chrome that lets people make an informed choice that applies across their web browsing and enables them to adjust that choice at any time.

“We’re discussing this new path with regulators and will engage with the industry as we roll this out,” Chavez said.

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Jazrawy 

While not a fan of third-party cookie tracking, Jane Jazrawy, CEO of online driver training firm CarriersEdge, said Google’s move is nevertheless great news for truckers using the tech.

“The biggest effect,” she said, “is that if a trucking company relies on third-party tracking to entice customers or potential drivers, they don’t have to look for another solution elsewhere — for now.”

Not surprisingly, many privacy advocates — who have been hounding Google for more than five years to block ad tech companies from tracking the behaviors of consumers on the web with third-party cookies — are incensed.

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Maréchal 

“While users may have the right — and should have the option — to communicate opt-out preferences, it doesn’t make sense to require users to make complex decisions with unclear implications about technical mechanisms like third-party cookies,” said Nathalie Maréchal, co-director of the privacy and data project at the Center for Democracy & Technology.

Not surprisingly, the reaction from advertisers and marketers who rely heavily on the use of third-party cookies has been much more upbeat. Many believe that businesses will be able to continue the use of third-party cookies to track consumer behavior for many more months, and perhaps for many more years.

In everyday practice, that means ad tech companies — which often have cookie deals with hundreds, thousands or tens of thousands of websites where they run advertising — still will be able to put a cookie in your Chrome browser when you visit one of the sites or digital properties serviced by their ad tech.

Moreover, every time you visit another site serviced by that same ad tech company, it places another tracking cookie in your Chrome browser, and it gets just a bit more information on what you’re clicking on.

After using third-party cookies to track your behavior on dozens, hundreds or even thousands of websites, the ad tech company has an extremely deep understanding of who you are, what your interests are and what you buy.

Even so, despite this most recent victory in the “cookie wars,” many marketers and advertisers believe the best move for brands is to continue with their plans to slowly abandon cookies for other advertising alternatives.

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Albertini 

“Chrome’s elevated user choice will allow users to disable cookies — and when it launches there will likely be a high initial third-party cookie loss rate,” said Nick Albertini, chief technology officer at IT consulting firm Acceleration. “This will decrease the value of third-party cookies.”

Richard Howe, CEO at digital advertising services provider Inuvo, agreed. He noted that in 2021, when Apple offered users of its Safari web browser a clear option to opt out of all tracking by internet advertisers, more than 90% of consumers did just that, effectively killing off the Safari browser as an advertising tool.

Many experts within the trucking industry feel similarly.

“Overall, and as a general rule, tracking cookies just are not the right way to go,” said Artie Crawford, director of cybersecurity at National Motor Freight Traffic Association. “I think at one point in time they were perceived as really ‘cool,’ because when they first came out, people had ‘directed’ content based on surfing patterns.”

But over the years, increasing numbers of web users began to see cookies as invasive as they realized their every move on the web was being tracked, Crawford indicated.

In fact, the backlash to tracking cookies has been so pronounced that it may be in a trucking business’ best interest to simply get out in front of the issue and package your company as a highly visible champion of web privacy.

If you’ve decided to completely eschew the use of cookies in your advertising, here’s a game plan recommended by Maura Pierson, vice president at digital marketing firm DAC:

• Match your ads to publisher content: Back in the days before internet tracking, advertisers reached out to consumers by running ads alongside content that dovetailed with the goods and services they were selling. In a cookie-less world, that’s a solid move once again.
   
• Feed all your customer data into a single data- base: Advanced marketers already are using customer data platforms, or CDPs, which ingest data from a wide spectrum of inputs — including email, chat, phone, web browser and social network browsing — so that the company advertising and marketing departments can form deep profiles on potential and existing customers.
  
  It makes sense to “unify user identities across touchpoints to enhance targeting and personalization while respecting privacy,” Pierson said.
   
• Consider adding dynamic websites and dynamic marketing emails to your marketing mix: Everything you learn about your customer or potential customer via your CDP can be used to highly personalize the web pages that your customers view or the marketing emails that hit their inboxes, according to Pierson.
   
• Stay current on new marketing technology: Given the breakneck speed at which tech has been progressing, knowing exactly what is available — and what’s coming soon — can be make-or-break for a brand.
  
  “Ensure your technology stack supports data and privacy needs,” Pierson said. “And invest in tools for compliant data collection and analysis.”
   
• Keep a close eye on what Google does next: Google has been regularly making — and regularly breaking — promises to bring greater privacy to web consumers, so it’s imperative that you stay current on what Google says next — and what Google actually does next, according to Pierson.

Joe Dysart is an internet speaker and business consultant based in Manhattan. Voice: (631) 233-9770. Email: joe@customtechadvisor .com. Web: dysartnewsfeatures.com.