As we know, personalised ads are based on third-party cookies which track the audience to target it. However, such tracking is likely to end by 2023. There will be then cookie-less advertising world. Advertising planning then will depend on authentic and anonymous data. First-party advertiser data collected with consumer consent is key data. It pertains to customers who are already affiliated to the brand. The attempt is to balance privacy with personalisation. There are innovations such as contextual targeting and cohort-based data gathering to do so.

Audience planning uses a mix of identifiers. These could be deterministic, probabilistic or contextual. It will be based on device-based data, contextual signals and cookie-less channels such as CTV, DOOH, mobile advertising and so on.

Programmatic will be data-driven. Brands must build up consumer data platform. They should enhance the first-party data, say pixels on the website or mobile app signals. This should be supplemented by third-party audience data, say device id and contextual signals. In a post-cookie world, the targeting would be mostly contextual.