Zero-party data: it’s information that consumers intentionally and proactively share with a brand. This information can include preferences, purchase intentions, personal context, and how they want a brand to interact with them. It’s a transparent and consensual exchange of information, unlike first-party data collected through interactions, second-party data that’s received secondhand from partners, and third-party data purchased from external sources. Zero-Party data is highly accurate and reliable while considering consumer privacy considerations.

This type of data has many benefits, but some may wonder if this focus on privacy diminishes the ability to precisely target and engage an audience. In actuality, zero-party data uniquely lends itself to providing an avenue to improve consumer experiences. 

How Can This Benefit Consumers?

With accurate, timely information provided by consumers, brands and agencies can pinpoint more readily what an audience is looking for - and improve their advertising while meeting the needs of consumers. There are several ways this can be done:

Specific Recommendations: An online clothing retailer asks customers about their style preferences, favorite colors and sizes through an optional questionnaire when they sign up for an account. Using this data, the retailer can provide specified recommendations and tailor marketing emails to highlight items that best align with an audience's tastes. Customers receive relevant suggestions, making their shopping experiences smoother and more enjoyable.

Relevant Offers: A travel company collects information voluntarily from customers on their preferred destinations, budget ranges, and types of vacations they desire. This data is then used to send relevant email campaigns featuring packages that match their recommendations. Subscribers receive offers directly pertinent to their interests - reducing the likelihood of unsubscribes and increasing consumers satisfaction in receiving the information they truly care about - and not just sales fluff.

Interactive Content: Let’s use a beauty brand as an example. Users take a quiz on their website where they list their skin type, beauty concerns, and favorite products. With this information, the brand can offer personalized skincare and product recommendations. Consumers are left feeling like the brand understands their unique needs, enhancing their trust and loyalty.

Enhanced Customer Support: When registering a new product, a tech company asks consumers to answer questions about their technical proficiency and preferred support method. Consumers receive support in their preferred format, improving their satisfaction - and opinion of the brand. 

How Ogury uses Zero-Party Data to Benefit Consumer Experiences 

At Ogury, our zero-party data-driven approach takes consumer privacy to the next level, as we focus on personas, not people. Our technology allows us to understand key audience details of a particular placement on a publisher site, allowing us to qualify our impressions at the placement level, not at the personal level. Combined with unique surveys central to our data model—always-on, they collect zero-party data at scale across thousands of placements—we received detailed insights into a persona, validating a placement's relevancy.

With over 1.3 M personas (groups of people that are anonymized and grouped together based on specific online behaviors and attributes at a placement level), brands and agencies can precisely target their preferred audiences, allowing them to activate hyper-specific campaigns. Consumers receive more relevant, engaging ads, and using Ogury’s rich creative formats, in a way that doesn’t disrupt their experience - all without the use of personally identifiable data. 

Zero-party data represents a paradigm shift in how brands interact with consumers. It removes the guesswork, allowing for tailored experiences relevant to users. By leveraging this powerful data type, agencies and brands can create more strategic and engaging experiences that build trust, drive engagement, and improve consumer experiences.