By Celeste Roberts, content manager, Active Prospect
Interest in renewable energy is currently blowing up in the consumer, commercial, and industrial sectors. Solar power finds itself at the core of this push for more renewable energy, which means solar power providers will soon have their work cut out for them in this competitive space. For solar industry marketers, the big question is, how can they reach their potential customers more effectively?
For years, the answer was to focus on third-party cookies to collect user data.
These tracking files can provide a lot of useful user data, such as which websites they visit most frequently and what their interests are. With this detailed data, marketers can create user profiles to create more targeted advertising, which ideally leads to increased sales numbers.
But now, it looks like third-party cookies are going the way of the dinosaur. In a number of statements, Google, owner of Chrome, the world’s most popular web browser, has made it clear that the company plans to soon end support for third-party cookies. While this move has been delayed until 2024, it’s only a matter of time before we enter a cookieless future.
Why are third-party cookies disappearing?
While you’ll often hear people talking about the coming “cookie apocalypse,” it’s important to remember that not all cookies are going away — just the third-party ones. First-party cookies, or user data you gather from your own site, will still be around, and they’ll likely become even more important for feeding ad algorithms once third-party cookies are gone.
As for why third-party cookies are being removed, the answer is data privacy concerns. More and more people are becoming uncomfortable with the idea of being tracked by third parties during their web browsing.
In 2019, Pew Research Center conducted a survey that asked Americans how they feel about data privacy. About 81% of respondents said that the potential risks from data collection outweigh the benefits. A number of high-profile data breaches in recent years have only served to heighten concerns among the public about how their data is being gathered and used by businesses.
In short, the end of third-party cookies was a foregone conclusion. Most other web browsers, such as Mozilla Firefox and Apple’s Safari have already gotten rid of them, and it was only a matter of time before Google also caved.
A new marketing strategy
Third-party cookies might be heading out, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t other ways to gather customer data. Here are three data gathering tips for solar industry marketers:
1. Focus on your first-party data
First-party data can still provide highly useful information, such as where users are from, how often they visit your site, and what items they’ve added to their shopping carts. Putting more effort into unifying and utilizing this data can yield a lot of benefits.
For instance, if you notice that a user spends a lot of time looking at the product page for one of your solar panels but hasn’t made a purchase yet, you can probably assume that the financial cost is what’s holding them back. Sending the user a newsletter with a special limited-time discount coupon might provide the push they need to place an order. Knowing a user’s location can also allow you to target them with newsletters on local government grants for solar energy upgrades.
However, the challenge with only using first-party data is that it still leaves a lot of room for guesswork. What made third-party cookies so useful was that they filled in a lot of information gaps by monitoring user behavior all around the web, not just on your site. Trying to get the same level of information using only first-party data will require more extrapolation.
2. Gather zero-party data
If you have information gaps in your customer profiles, the best thing you can do is go straight to customers and ask them for this information. This is known as zero-party data, and it’s when customers voluntarily share information on their preferences, purchase intentions, and life plans. Why would customers provide you with this information? Because you’re going to give them something in return.
Anytime a user visits your site or makes a purchase, ask them to fill in a short survey on their communication preferences (e.g., email, SMS, personal calls, etc.), why they are interested in solar power, and what their long-term plans are. In return, you provide them with a gift, which could be a discount coupon, an ebook on solar power, or a free estimate. You could also design a quiz in which users share information in exchange for specialized product or package recommendations.
3. Be transparent about how you use collected data
Being completely upfront about the data you’re collecting and what you intend to do with it is more important than ever. This is particularly true if you do business in California or the EU, both of which have passed strict laws governing the collection of user data, with hefty fines for companies that don’t comply.
People can be suspicious when their data is being collected, but so long as you’re open about why you’re doing it, they’re more likely to trust you. Always give users the option to adjust how their data is collected, and make it easy for them to simply opt out. Those who don’t want any of their data collected will appreciate your honesty, while those who don’t mind sharing their data in exchange for something in return will enjoy a greater sense of customer care.
Thanks to a booming industry and new advances in solar tech, the solar industry has incredible profit potential for the future. But that’s only if you can beat out the competition and convert more leads into customers. Your marketing strategy will be the key to achieving that, and in a cookieless world, it helps to stay on top of new and improved ways to reach your customers.
Celeste Roberts is a content writer at ActiveProspect, a consent-based marketing platform tailored to the solar industry.
Solarman says
Having a “ghost program” running on one’s machine that has preloaded search data to send to collection algorithms, then having a table that blocks pop ups from these collectors would be a neat way to clean up one’s system of garbage data use during any online session. Just sayin’, no matter what companies do with cookies in the future, we all need a “talk to the hand” officer running on our machines to protect us from information overload. Transparency has been mentioned and should be a large part of security from now on.