>> KAREN: Hi, everyone. Thank you for joining. I’m Karen Stocks, Managing Director
of Measurement Solutions at Google.
In my day-to-day job, I’ve heard a lot of concerns about measurement in today’s privacy environment,
and I spend a lot of time ensuring Google’s solutions can help.
The main questions I’m hearing from advertisers and agencies are
how do I preserve measurement with our tagging and consent products,
how do I fill gaps and generate more-granular insights with techniques like modeling,
and how are you communicating the developments that are happening in the Privacy Sandbox
to deliver measurement without tracking individuals across the web?
Today, I’m delighted to be joined by Saurabh Sharma, our Senior Director of Product Management at Google.
Welcome, Saurabh.
>> SAURABH: Hey, Karen. Glad to be here.
So, before we get started, I’d actually love to ask you a question first off.
What are you hearing from customers and from the industry about measurement?
>> KAREN: There’s a lot impacting marketers today.
So, from regulation and technology changes to evolving customers’ expectations and behaviors,
many marketers are feeling that there’s no clear answer on what to do.
In my conversations with them, several themes keep coming up.
Firstly, how am I balancing privacy while maintaining a complete picture of performance.
Secondly, how to be transparent around customer data usage, ensuring that the data I do use is consented.
And thirdly, how do you use first-party data and bring it together with cross-platform tools.
So tell me, Saurabh, how are you thinking about this from a product management perspective?
>> SAURABH: The most important thing that I want to highlight is that at Google,
upholding consumer privacy while preserving measurability remains our true north.
That said, at Google we realize that there is no one-size-fits-all solution, and we are invested
in multiple different solutions for marketers to continue to measure over time.
We also recognize there’s lots of unknowns in the industry, and there’s a lot of changes
that are happening very rapidly, and that can be frustrating and challenging.
But, we are committed to helping marketers navigate through these challenges.
>> KAREN: So, you’ve touched on our vision for the future of measurement being privacy first.
We think about this aligned to a few key pillars:
preserving conversion measurement without tracking individuals across the web,
informing and augmenting gaps in data that arise due to some of the industry
changes that we’ve spoken about, and then securing data through additional controls.
So, tell me, how do these principles come to life for marketers?
>> SAURABH: Yeah, good question. So, ultimately, we believe the future is all about consented and modeled,
when cookies and other identifiers are not available. And so, talk about the three pillars,
from a product perspective, we also think about the same ones around
preserving, informing, and securing.
So, preserving is really about maintaining existing data. And so, for example, using things
like site tagging, first-party data, and collecting user consent that marketers can do today.
Informing is really about supplementing gaps in data, and primarily if we’re doing this
through machine learning techniques such as conversion modeling in a privacy-safe way.
And finally, securing. This is really about future-proofing your data
and using new privacy-preserving technology like the Privacy Sandbox.
The important thing to remember here is that these three pillars address both measurement
and optimization of your media campaigns, and they’re durable over the long run.
>> KAREN: So, in addition to the Privacy Sandbox, third-party cookies and the use of other
identifiers are evolving. There’s an increased focus on first-party data, whether it’s from tagging
or customers’ own business data, like CRMs.
So, which tools can marketers use today for tagging and conversion measurement?
>> SAURABH: Today marketers can use Google Tag Manager or global site tag
as a key foundational step.
In addition, we’re bringing you the ability to measure conversions more accurately
even when cookies aren’t available, but through a product known as enhanced conversions.
And so, enhanced conversions work by allowing your conversion tags, including Google Analytics,
to use consented, hashed first-party data from your conversion page for measurement in a privacy-safe way.
Enhanced conversions also work across devices, for a better representation of total user behavior.
I’ll give you a quick example. So, British online fashion and cosmetic retailer ASOS
tested using enhanced conversions to help fill in gaps in conversion measurement.
And what they saw was conversion rates on search increased by 8.6%, and YouTube conversion
increased by 31%.
>> KAREN: Wow. They’re great results. So, having a more complete view of
user behavior is critical and can help you make insights-driven business decisions.
And, if you explain exactly what data is being collected and how it will be used,
customers can make informed decisions in the type of experiences they can have with your
brand depending on their privacy needs. So, let me look at another example.
As the marketing landscape shifted at the height of the pandemic, Nissan in Asia-Pacific developed
digital experiences such as virtual showrooms to help customers view cars on display
from the safety of their homes. In exchange for these experiences, people provided
their contact information. And so, with this first-party data, Nissan was able
to better understand and serve their customers and achieved 5 times higher test-drive requests
via their website at a 9 times lower cost. Really great results.
So, with all that in mind, what are we building to help marketers ensure that they’re giving
customers choice about how their data is collected and used?
>> SAURABH: Customer choice and consent is building on work we’re doing already.
Last year, we introduced Consent Mode for marketers in the European Economic Area and the United Kingdom.
And this feature is really about providing new tag settings that customizes how Google tags behave
before and after users make consent decisions. So, for users that don’t consent, Google tags will
adjust automatically how they behave and not use cookies when permissions have not been granted.
And so, these changes respect user choices about their cookies while also helping advertisers more
effectively measure performance in a seamless way.
In addition, we’re introducing new capabilities built directly into Tag Manager itself.
So, for marketers that are using a consent management solution, you can integrate directly into Tag Manager
without having to edit any website code. On the other hand, if you are a tag developer, Tag Manager will
allow you to integrate directly with Consent Mode solutions. And, it will already show you which tags
already incorporate consent and control tag behavior based on consent status without having to modify
any of your setup. And the best news of all is you can enable these new capabilities in Tag Manager today.
>> KAREN: That’s really great to hear. So, another question I’m getting asked by marketers
is concern that measurement gaps are leaving blank spots in my customers’ journeys.
And, this can be due to increasing industry challenges like cookie loss.
How can techniques like conversion modeling help marketers unlock more-accurate measurement
and better performance?
>> SAURABH: So, right now we’ve been talking about preserving data, which is a first step
and a critical foundational component of being able to measure user behavior.
And, it’s important to do these things in tandem. But, it’s also important because it helps inform
conversion modeling efforts when ad interactions and conversions can’t be observed.
So, for example, we talked about enhanced conversions, and ads conversion solutions actually capture
more conversion data and improves the overall quality of conversion modeling. Another example is
within Consent Mode, we’re already using conversion modeling today to address gaps in observable data.
And, what I would say is conversion modeling enables better optimizations to make your campaigns
even more effective, and it provides accurate performance for advertisers, already integrated
with reporting and optimization tools within Google.
>> KAREN: That’s a really good point. When businesses experience gaps in conversion measurement,
conversion modeling can help them gain a more complete picture of their conversions.
But modeling and machine learning can help in more ways than just conversion measurement.
So, can you share more about how you’re thinking about modeling and machine learning across
multiple different use cases?
>> SAURABH: So, there’s a few different examples that I can point to within Google Analytics.
First off, we’re extending Google Analytics to have behavioral reports that really
provide modeling capabilities that allow marketers to get a better sense of their customers.
Secondly, we’re working on ways to provide user journeys across sites and apps in a
privacy-safe manner.
Third, we’re introducing a new modular Google Analytics that has an advertiser experience
that centralizes our most important ads-related capabilities, making these features easier
to discover and use. And, in the future, we plan to use modeling to be able to provide insights and
recommendations to further optimize your campaign.
>> KAREN: Oh, that’s really great to hear about where we’re going with Analytics.
But one of the other questions I always get from customers is for better understanding of
which bits of my media are working best for me? Where am I getting the best returns?
So, can you tell me, what’s the latest in lift measurement, and how are your product teams ensuring
that these solutions remain durable as we’re going through this changing environment?
>> SAURABH: So, this ties back to the securing long-term durability, and it builds on
the themes of preserving and informing.
So, measurement products rely on durable foundations like tagging, consent, and enhanced conversions.
And, then on top of that, we build machine learning models to constantly update and ensure accurate
and up-to-date results on user behavior.
In addition, businesses that are equipped to run incrementality experiments can now also run
Brand Lift, Search Lift, and Conversion Lift measurement on the same campaign. These are
privacy-durable solutions that provide results across the entire consumer journey.
An example here is Fiverr, which is a freelance services marketplace. They ran YouTube ads to reach
audiences and used Brand Lift, Search Lift, and Conversion Lift to measure full-funnel performance.
And, what they saw was strong lift across all three measurement pieces, including a 62% lift in searches
on Google and YouTube and a 30% lift in new users.
>> KAREN: Again, I’m really impressed with results. So, looking to the future, how are emerging
technologies being developed in the Privacy Sandbox going to help in the measurement space?
>> SAURABH: The Privacy Sandbox is really designed to support key measurement use cases, including
click-through conversions, view-through conversions, and cross-device conversions while at the same time
protecting people’s privacy. Now, proposals are still in the development stage, and it’s still early days,
but we’re working on behalf of marketers to handle a lot of that implementation complexity.
>> KAREN: As browser technologies evolve and regulations grow, marketers have an opportunity to
proactively lead and foster innovation for a more privacy-forward environment. And, you know what?
There is a lot that we can do now, and the time to act is now.
So, Saurabh, do you have any final thoughts for everybody?
>> SAURABH: I just want to say we look forward to partnering very closely with marketers as we navigate
this journey together. We’re committed to providing you solutions to effectively measure digital campaigns
while also providing a privacy-safe experience for users. And, the key thing that I just want folks
to remember is you can get started now to ensure that your business continues to grow despite all
of these changes.
>> KAREN: Saurabh, thank you for the insights and inspiration.
And thank you everyone for joining us today.