Data Privacy and the Future of Marketing for DMOs, Attractions & Suppliers

Entering 2020, marketers will discover a changing digital world governed by a new set of laws — most notably from the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), which went into effect on January 1 and is the first large-scale U.S. law protecting consumers’ digital data. Known to some as “GDPR Light,” CCPA poses new challenges to for-profit businesses working in California.

So what’s next on the horizon for digital privacy? And what do marketers need to be prepared for?

In my opinion, the greatest threat to today’s digital marketing space is privacy legislation. I’m not saying that it isn’t needed — it most definitely is — but how it is enacted is going to be critical to our industry surviving.

The internet has broken down civic borders and made our world a much more global community, but our laws still follow a traditional civic model. If our industry cannot prove our ability to self-regulate and compromise in legislation at the federal level, we risk individual municipality-driven laws that will cripple our ability to market, transact and measure our success across borders the same way we can now. Having to manage federal, state, county and city laws, all with varying statutes, will make digital marketing as we know it today impossible.

So what are we as an industry doing about it? While there is consistent focus and effort being put into federal privacy legislation, the huge push that is currently happening is around self-regulation.

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), Google and Apple are the largest players in this space, all with competing proposals for what the future of privacy looks like. Across all three we see a concerted effort to move away from cookies, a greater emphasis on browser storage, the monitoring of a privacy budget to thwart fingerprinting and the overall limiting of the ability to synch data between partners.

Browser-based changes are rolling out fast and furious as our industry races against public perception. As a marketer, be prepared for the metrics you use to have definition changes, for Safari to provide less and less data and to spend more time and money on managing your digital programs. Remember that your digital marketing data is directional, not exact.

Want to learn more actionable strategies for navigating digital media and data privacy in 2020? I will be discussing the issues above and more during my presentation on “Data Privacy and the Future of Marketing for DMOs, Attractions & Supplies” at the International Marketing Forum West on February 25, 2020, in Marina del Rey, California. Register now to attend.

Session details:

Data Privacy and the Future of Marketing for DMOs, Attractions & Suppliers

Europe’s launch of GDPR has started a wave of new data privacy regulations around the world that are fundamentally changing how destinations reach global consumers. With increased importance being placed on “first-party” data, destinations and attractions will soon be challenged to find targeted audiences through “traditional” digital network providers. At the same time, travel agents and tour operators have an opportunity to leverage the first-party consumer data they have collected to create innovative new ways to partner with DMOs and other suppliers. In this session, get a better understanding of what regulations like GDPR mean for the industry and how destinations and travel providers need to adapt to be effective.