Part 1 Marketing foundations
of first-party data
Digital marketing is shifting, with growing restrictions on third-party data collection and increasing consumer expectations around privacy. Marketers face tightening regulations and browser restrictions that limit third-party cookies and external tracking. Instead, businesses must focus on first-party data—information collected directly from customers with consent—to build sustainable, privacy-first marketing strategies. This part of the book lays the groundwork for understanding the role of first-party data in modern marketing.
Chapter 1 introduces how privacy laws and browser restrictions fragment third-party data and why brands must prioritize customer data to remain competitive. Chapter 2 explores privacy-centric marketing, showing how businesses can balance personalization with compliance, navigating evolving regulations and consumer expectations. Chapter 3 provides a structured approach—crawl, walk, run—to gradually implement a first-party data strategy while demonstrating effect. Chapter 4 then guides marketers in selecting the right first-party data technologies, distinguishing between customer data platforms (CDPs), marketing data lakehouses, and composable CDPs.
By the end of this section, you’ll understand why first-party data is central to modern marketing and how to approach it strategically in an increasingly regulated digital landscape.