Advertising has always been a balancing act among the needs of three primary constituencies: advertisers, publishers and consumers. But industry practices over the last two decades have thrown the balance off, driving consumers away.

Three major forces - privacy legislation, 3rd party cookie degradation and the rise of 'walled garden' ad environments are a byproduct of this imbalance and will shape the immediate future of advertising.

Advertisers must reorient their ad efforts using a lens of relationship intimacy to dictate audience targeting and personalization strategies and focus on value delivery to consumers in the ad experiences themselves.

Expectations:

• First- and second-party data investments will supplant third-party data
  
  
• The cookie will be replaced by a privacy-compliant identify infrastructure
  
  
• Advertisers will accept gated data access but not a world of many walls
  
  

Now is the time to right the balance among advertisers, publishers, and consumers. People may say that they hate advertising, but according to Forrester research, 42% of surveyed consumers say ads are a good way to learn about new products. Rethink the ways in which you present your products, services, and even your voice.

Will data-driven marketing still be possible, and how to prepare for the next wave of advertising, data, and technology that respects individuals and promotes transparency and choice.

If you got a lot of success with one-on-one marketing, your focus should be on how to keep that. Figure what the new one-on-one consumer channels will be — display advertising, social, or even television (Netflix is still relevant).

There might still be opportunities for peer-to-peer sharing, but you'll need to change your approach drastically.

If before we simply pumped data into every channel and tried to see if that'll work, now you'll need to think about a user experience a lot more.

Measurements are going to be gravely disrupted. Marketers will have a hard time comparing their campaigns to the previous years.

DMPs are going to change their approach, and there is no roadmap for that yet.

Smart strategy is the key to success. Building a smart strategy means:

• You don't have to work hard to achieve success, just think out of the box.

• Be authentic regardless of who you are.

• Defining/redefining your target audience is essential in order to be relevant.

Social & Digital strategy outtakes:

• Have goals that are both attainable and aspirational (short + long-term strategy).

• Understand your targets (there is a person behind every company and role)

• Take a deep dive, understand lifestyle, associations, behavioral patterns to inform your plan and approach. Use this to fine tune your strategy or A/B test for paid social media campaigns.

Stratify your messaging and match it with unique actions across the funnel. This is especially important now, considering that new consumer habits have emerged.

Some people may be happy to save more and spend less in certain categories, while others may make up for lost consumerism once they are able to shop in stores again and travel.

If the outcomes you're measuring against are too narrow, and your marketing doesn't match your audience's needs, you can turn off a potential customer who isn't ready to engage.

We pulled the Hard Work Works campaign soon after the coronavirus was declared a pandemic. The bank also paused campaigns slated for later in the year, such as a series on how children and adults think differently about money.

Has run a "thanks" campaign focused on essential workers and volunteers, released new content geared toward small business owners and people who have recently lost their jobs.

The bank's marketing and analytics teams are collaborating to ensure they are taking their audience's feedback to heart.

Overall, the key outtakes from the summit were to pay more attention to the customers, respect their data and think more thoroughly about their use. The post-cookie world is yet an unexplored one, however it is not the hellish landscape some paint it to be. Advertisers and brands will need to change in order to succeed, and to listen more attentively to the feedback they get from the consumer, as marketers have long been focused on the metrics they want to improve — CPMs, ROAS, CTR, but none of these take the consumer into account, the first speaker of the conference, Joanna O'Connel, said.