Third-party cookies are on their way out, but the deep-data connection to your future audience isn’t gone for good.

This shift to first-party data allows you to pinpoint and own your audience’s valid preferences, giving you greater control over your content strategy, customer experience, and marketing journey.

First-party cookies are now your golden ticket to the perfect user experience and higher conversions.

But how do you get your email subscribers to share their preferences with your brand?

How do you get the information you need to customize their experience?

Ann Handley, Chief Content Officer at MarketingProfs and Wall Street Journal’s bestselling author, joined me on the SEJ Show to give you proven steps to gather first-party cookies.

In this podcast, you’ll learn to connect with your audience, maintain relevant marketing campaigns, and nurture your owned audience to conversion. Available on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen.

When I look at that cookie or the idea of a post-cookie world, and when I look more holistically at what’s going on in digital marketing, I think that we have an opportunity to not think about the death of cookies like it’s death (in some ways it is because we’re losing that access to bits of third-party data) but actually to reframe it as an opportunity to reboot our customer relationships. –Ann Handley, 25:32

Email is new again. –Ann Handley, 23:09

Sometimes there’s an over-compensation for the short term instead of playing the long game. Playing the long game is what we can do from a content perspective.–Loren Baker, 48:07

[00:00] – Ann Handley’s background.
[06:25] – Pillars to create great content.
[09:24] – Example of an airline using good content.
[12:18] – Are avatars important when you’re writing?
[13:15] – Our job as marketers when it comes to writing.
[16:40] – Google vs. Safari dropping the third-party cookies.
[16:67] – How to relate your content to something newsworthy.
[21:46] – Tips for getting emails opened and adding value to your list.
[30:43] – Companies that humanized their approach to content.
[33:00] – An example of how JetBlue approaches its content.
[36:07] – Ann’s thoughts on building subscriber lists on social media channels.
[40:18] – Other ways to use email newsletter lists.
[51:32] – Content marketing ideas to take “offline”.
[52:28] – A nice example of print content.
[62:38] – How do you communicate your content to people?

Resources Mentioned:
Road ID – https://www.roadid.com/
Books: Everybody Writes & Content Rules – https://annhandley.com/books/
Marketing Profs – https://www.marketingprofs.com/

Part of the reason I believe so strongly in email and whether it’s a post-cookie world or not is because it’s such a tremendous opportunity to connect directly with one person at one time. –Ann Handley, 24:08

It’s going to cut down on the amount of retargeting, remarketing, and data that third parties have about you, but first parties may be able to have it.–Loren Baker, 18:35

Instead of approaching your marketing with this level of anxiety…If we’ve done our jobs right from a content and an SEO standpoint, it will ultimately pay off in the long term. I think sometimes the reason that short-term thinking happens is that we have this anxiety around it.–Ann Handley, 48:32

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Connect with Ann Handley:

​​Ann is a pioneer in the world of digital marketing. A Wall Street Journal Best-Selling Author, LinkedIn Influencer and Writer, partner at MarketingProfs, and Founder of ClickZ, she has made an indelible mark on how we think about content and marketing.

She has handled the tough topics of writing and content marketing with finesse. As an expert in her field, she has authored two best-selling books, “Everybody Writes” and “Content Rules.”

Her influence extends beyond being a speaker and author, as Ann has guided many companies to develop marketing strategies that work.

Connect with Ann on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annhandley/
Follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/annhandley/
Visit her website: https://annhandley.com/

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker
Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

Ann shared valuable insights about first-party cookies on this episode of the Search Engine Journal Show, so be sure to catch it on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen.