In this blog, we’ll explore why third-party data is collapsing and how brands can thrive by embracing first-party strategies. We’ll highlight how industry players are adapting – from publishers like Publift to tech firms like Avenga – and offer a blueprint that combines your internal CRM/CDP data with AnthologyAI’s real-time, anonymized consumer dataset. The goal is to show how this combination unlocks privacy-first audience targeting, lookalike modeling, competitive benchmarking, and performance measurement, effectively replacing the cookie-era tactics with a more durable, ethical approach.
Several forces are driving the end of third-party data in marketing:
For advertisers, these shifts mean traditional third-party tracking and ad targeting methods are rapidly deteriorating. Third-party cookies in particular had issues even before their demise – they struggled to track users across multiple devices and often delivered incomplete or duplicative data, leading to wasted spend and poor attribution As these legacy signals disappear, brands are left with significant gaps in customer insight and campaign performance measurement. The only viable path forward is to replace those diminishing third-party signals with reliable first-party data.
As third-party options wane, first-party data – the information a company collects directly from its own customers and audiences – has become the cornerstone of modern advertising. This includes everything from website analytics and mobile app data to CRM records and loyalty program info. Critically, first-party data is collected and used within the brand’s own domain, so it faces fewer privacy roadblocks; for example, first-party cookies (set by your own site to remember user preferences) are not being phased out. In a cookieless future, data that you gather with user consent on your own channels is a stable foundation to rebuild targeting and personalization.
Industry players are already proving the power of a first-party focus. Publishers with rich first-party databases are “well positioned to survive in the cookie-free world.” Publift, for instance, has helped its clients achieve an average 55% uplift in ad revenue since 2015 by leaning into first-party data and cutting-edge programmatic technology. On the solutions side, tech firms are doubling down on first-party approaches as well. Avenga – a global IT consulting company – emphasizes first-party data in its ad-tech offerings, noting that its custom retail media solutions leverage first-party data for omnichannel targeting and programmatic revenue generation. In short, companies across the ecosystem are recognizing that first-party data isn’t just a compliance move; it’s key to maintaining marketing effectiveness when third-party tactics fall away.
Collecting more first-party data of your own is vital, but brands don’t have to go it alone. AnthologyAI’s point of view is that the strongest strategy combines a brand’s internal first-party data with an external, ethically sourced first-party panel to fill in the gaps. AnthologyAI has built a revolutionary consumer data panel (the Caden app) that allows users to willingly share their data in exchange for rewards – providing a real-time, consented stream of consumer insights. Unlike data brokers of old, who often aggregated opaque third-party info, Anthology “sources precise data directly from consumers and their interactions with brands” via a consent-based app that ethically collects data in full compliance with privacy regulations. In other words, Anthology’s dataset is first-party at its core – it comes straight from users who have opted in, creating a single source of truth that is both privacy-safe and richly detailed.
The result is a hyper-panel of consumer behavior at a scale and depth few organizations could achieve alone. AnthologyAI’s platform connects “billions of multidimensional consumer data-points in near real-time across retail, spend, location, transport, travel, entertainment, demographic, political affiliation and more”, delivering decision intelligence and predictive capabilities that traditional data sources can’t match. All these data points – from receipt-level retail purchases to geolocation pings – are continuously fed into Anthology’s AI models, which are trained on “tens of billions of unbiased, real-time behavioral signals and transactions (all sourced directly and ethically from users)”. The panel currently includes over 200,000 consumers who contribute data, with updates provided on a weekly, biweekly, or monthly basis to keep insights fresh. In terms of breadth and granularity, Anthology’s first-party dataset offers a multidimensional perspective on consumer behavior that is rarely matched in depth and breadth by other data providers.
For brands, the blueprint is to enrich your own customer data with this expansive panel data. By blending your internal CRM/CDP records with Anthology’s anonymized behavioral data, you eliminate the blind spots left by third-party decay. In fact, Anthology enables clients to “generate entirely new datasets or significantly enrich their existing ones, eliminating the dependency on internal data resources and opening up new possibilities for insights and strategy.” A retailer, for example, could take its list of loyalty program customers and merge it with Anthology’s panel to see those customers’ out-of-store purchase behavior, media consumption, travel habits, and more – all without violating privacy. Conversely, that retailer could use Anthology’s data to find high-potential prospects who resemble its best customers. This kind of enriched view is invaluable in a world where you can no longer rely on third-party cookies to infer what people are interested in. AnthologyAI’s ethical first-party panel effectively steps into the void left by cookie-based targeting, providing a richer and more compliant way to understand and reach consumers.
By combining internal and external first-party data, brands can unlock a host of advanced capabilities – all in a privacy-first manner. Here’s what becomes possible with a blueprint that unites your data with AnthologyAI’s anonymized consumer intelligence:
As third-party data collapses, brands that cling to old habits will find themselves increasingly in the dark. By contrast, those who pivot to a first-party data strategy – fortified with ethical data partnerships – will not only survive but thrive in the new landscape. It’s no exaggeration to say first-party data is now a mandate for survival in digital marketing’s next chapter. The good news is that the end of third-party cookies can be a catalyst for better marketing: more transparency, more relevance, and more respect for consumer privacy.
AnthologyAI’s platform offers a clear path forward for brands ready to embrace this future. By fusing your internal data with Anthology’s privacy-first, consent-based consumer dataset, you can rebuild your marketing on a foundation of trust and intelligence. The cookie era may be ending, but your ability to understand and engage customers will be stronger than ever – provided you put first-party data first. It’s first-party data or bust, and AnthologyAI stands ready to help brands make the leap and thrive in a cookieless world.
