WTF is piggybacking?

This article is a WTF explainer, in which we break down media and marketing’s most confusing terms. More from the series →

Piggyback rides can be fun for children. For website operators, not so much. 

Piggybacking — also known as cookie-syncing — is how an ad tech firm can drop a third-party cookie on a website’s visitors without being granted access by the website via another ad tech firm that the website has granted access, as covered in the explainer skit above. 

An issue with this third-party tracking daisy-chain is that it makes it difficult for website operators to rein in outside companies’ abilities to collect information about their audiences, which risks putting the operators in privacy regulators’ crosshairs.

https://digiday.com/?p=469585

More in Marketing

More brands are blending deterministic and probabilistic data for hybrid targeting approaches

Advertisers are exploring AI-assisted lookalike modeling for new audience targeting approaches — brought on by the fading third-party cookie.

The Home Depot adds another acronym — ‘ROMO’ — in next phase of negotiating retail media network measurement

The Home Depot is pitching a new acronym: ROMO, or return on marketing objectives, in addition to return on ad spend (ROAS) to help marketers paint a more holistic picture of their campaign efficacy. 

‘It’s become a personality brand now’: Why Tesla’s brand perception is in a tricky spot as sales slump

Elon Musk has become a polarizing figure given his role in President Donald Trump’s administration and it looks like the ripple effects of that polarization are affecting the Tesla brand.