Data clean room innovation offers a solution to digital advertising’s woes, but the key to successful adoption is ease of use. Here, Vlad Stesin, chief strategy officer and co-founder, Optable, discusses in detail why simplicity is essential when considering data clean rooms.

When it comes to innovation, complexity kills; it is the ease of use that is crucial to successful tech adoption. With the McKinsey Global Institute estimating that 25%-45% of new products fail — other commentators have the figure much higher, at 60-80% — it is critical that solutions developed to address advertising’s challenges around trust, legislation and privacy have the end-user in mind. And if data clean rooms want to become advertising’s savior, success lies in simplicity.

After all, it is a laser focus on making sophisticated products that are easy to use that has made Apple so successful. And part of Tesla’s stellar growth has come from rolling out its own network of charging stations, making it easy for drivers to refuel and overcoming one major obstacle around electric car adoption. From Netflix to McDonald’s to Google, simplicity — if only at the point of the customer interface — is a reliable characteristic of the most prosperous and effective brands.

Even in partnerships, simplicity is the most important factor when weighing up collaborations with other companies, according to an IDC survey published in May. In the report, 91% of the partners rated ‘ease of doing business as the top attribute when they are considering partnering, rating it comfortably above ‘market/customer demand’ at 80%. Everyone likes ease. 

Ease, Simplicity and the Data Clean Room

Today, data clean rooms are garnering more attention as a solution to deliver a better, privacy-safe and more sustainable approach to data-driven targeting that’s also mindful of consumers’ needs. And once again, the virtues of ease and simplicity are among the critical considerations.  These data safe houses focus on enabling collaboration between partners on the basis of audience or customer data. They offer neutral, privacy-compliant environments where brands, publishers, and agencies can safely and securely store, share and connect with audiences without exposing customer information. 

Whether they are used to extract audience insights for planning or measurement or to allow direct data activation for campaign targeting, they are a real option for powering tomorrow’s advertising. 

Unite, Not Constrain 

Collaboration is at the heart of a data clean room, and as we have already said, successful partnerships hinge on their ease of use. The technology must allow seamless cooperation in a frictionless manner. 

Interoperability is critical, so partners are not forced to adopt the same external data platform to participate. The technology should unite, not constrain. Forcing one partner to take on a new platform when businesses are looking to rationalize tech stacks injects complexity and introduces an element of inequality in the partnership, which can, in turn, stifle the relationship.   

Ease of use must also mean a low-tech environment that any team can adopt without the need for specialist expertise or IT involvement. With resources stretched in many businesses, engaging internal support stifles the ability to get up and running quickly and deliver profitable partnerships. 

Ultimately, data clean room technology must be an enabler that removes complexity. It should make the whole process simple and quick, literally at the click of a button, from allowing a partner into a room to onboarding data from any platform and activating it in the manner required by the brand, be that via its DSP or through an ad server. This then frees up teams to focus on what is critical for their businesses — applying this data to deliver effective marketing campaigns. 

New Environments Need New Solutions

In many respects, the data clean room challenge reflects what Clayton Christensen discusses in The Innovator’s Dilemma — the challenge at hand should not be a technological one but a marketing one. By empowering the marketing team with the technology, they must then work out how best to take advantage of it to benefit their partners and the business. 

As this new era of advertising ushers in new rules of engagement, success hinges on having new tools to deliver impactful, compliant and consumer-centric messaging. In an industry rife with solutions to address advertising’s problems, ease of use is becoming an ever more important differentiator. And while some commentators are championing old approaches to tackling today’s issues, the industry can only move forward by embracing and incorporating innovative solutions such as data clean rooms.

Far from simply being a replacement for third-party cookies, data clean room innovation represents a new and better approach to advertising. It delivers what the industry needs — more control, more impactful campaigns, improved customer engagement and increased collaboration — but in a privacy-preserving manner that protects consumers and helps rebuild their trust in advertising.

Data clean rooms also offer the opportunity for greater equality, cooperation and inclusion across the industry. But success will come to those that not only solve advertising’s needs but do so in a way that is easy to implement. So, to repeat a simple message: if you are exploring data clean rooms, do not underestimate the value of simplicity. 

Also published in: Spice Works

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