Salesforce expands first-party data capabilities with new Snapchat, Google tie-ups

Dive Brief:

Salesforce, the customer relationship management (CRM) platform provider, made a series of announcements centered on helping marketers better tap into first-party data as part of its Connections 2021 event Wednesday.
The enterprise software company unveiled an Audience Match feature for Snapchat that lets marketers use their Salesforce data to target users on the video-sharing app with more personalized advertising and identify potential new audiences. Salesforce is also introducing an integration with Facebook-owned messaging platform WhatsApp that lets marketers more easily facilitate direct communications with consumers.
Additionally, Google is deepening its partnership with Salesforce to invest in first-party data solutions that keep privacy considerations in mind. These tie-ups come as adland girds itself for the deprecation of third-party cookies and grapples with other alterations to key identifiers.

Dive Insight:

Salesforce, the most widely used CRM platform, is pushing harder on products that cater to marketers' growing needs around first-party data. The slew of new platform integrations come as the industry contends with the pending deprecation of third-party cookies, a bedrock of online ad-targeting, as well as Apple making its mobile Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA) an opt-in feature earlier this year. The IDFA changes are expected to deliver a serious blow to platform revenue, as early reports indicate many users are choosing to disable tracking on their Apple devices, which inhibits marketers' ability to reach those users.

CRM platforms can be complex but basically do what their name implies: Help brands manage relationships with customers, including by leveraging troves of data on those customers. Salesforce's latest tie-ups with Snapchat and WhatsApp allow marketers to take those same first-party assets and apply them to other channels for the purposes of maintaining communications or delivering more personalized advertising. The news comes on the heels of Snapchat experiencing a surge in usage during pandemic as consumers spent more time online. WhatsApp's usage rate has been up and down during this period, in part because of privacy-related moves that led to some confusion.

The goal of Snapchat Audience Match, which is expected to be made widely available this month, is to help marketers create tailored, one-to-one content for users of the video-sharing platform while also growing their customer lists "by identifying new targets with similar characteristics to existing customers using lookalikes," per the announcement.

Salesforce at the same time is deepening its partnership with Google on developing first-party data solutions. Google helped spur the current rush for first-party data after announcing it would kill off third-party cookies in Chrome by 2022. Chrome commands about 65% of the global web browser market, according to a recent analysis from Statcounter. The Alphabet-owned tech giant is devising its own alternatives to the cookie — a move that has been met with some skepticism — along with working with partners like Salesforce to stake out a larger claim in the first-party data category.

"We're excited to partner with Salesforce to make it easier for marketers to activate and measure first-party data in a privacy-safe way," Tript Singh Lamba, director of product management at Google, said in a press statement.