First-Party Data

Dark data diagram of email, phone, customer ID and click link icons flowing into one glowing database that feeds three ad platform icons, with a pile of unused grey data blocks

Most First-Party Data Strategies Collect 40 Fields and Use 4

A first-party data strategy is a plan for collecting customer data through channels you own (checkout, forms, email, CRM), storing it under one customer ID, and sending it back to ad platforms and measurement tools. For most marketing teams, four fields do the bulk of the work: email, phone, a

Pop-art illustration of an open red padlock releasing email envelopes, shredded hash strips, a checked calendar and an audience gauge swinging toward green

Google Ads Stops Requiring Hashed Data Nov 16, Exposing Years of Bad Uploads

Google will stop requiring SHA-256 hashed customer data in Google Ads Data Manager on November 16, 2026, and will accept encrypted data by default instead, according to a Google email reported by PPC Land. Google will normalize and match identifiers itself inside a trusted execution environment, so formatting mistakes you

StreetEasy Took 2046 Reservations and Quietly Built a 20-Year Customer File

StreetEasy launched Reserve Your Future on May 20, 2026, letting New Yorkers book reservations dated 20 years out at 12 NYC venues including Russ & Daughters, the Guggenheim, and Playwrights Horizons. The campaign marks the platform's 20th anniversary and ships every booking with a verified name, email, and

Isometric illustration: NYT as a walled garden, with data streams from 150M logged-in readers feeding premium ad slots while programmatic exchange decays outside.

NYT Grew Digital Ads 31.6% on 150M Logged-In Readers, Not Better Creative

The New York Times grew digital advertising revenue 31.6% in Q1 2026 to $93.3 million, with net income climbing 77.4% to $87.9 million. The driver was not better creative or smarter programmatic. It was 150 million logged-in readers feeding a walled-garden first-party data set, plus a

Dark data visualization showing traffic decline curves converging into collaborative network nodes

Local Publishers Lost Half Their Traffic to AI. Their Response Is Worth Stealing.

A group of local publishers just did something that most individual publishers have been avoiding for years: they admitted the problem is too big to solve alone. According to AdExchanger's reporting, local news publishers in the Local Media Consortium are seeing 25 to 50 percent traffic declines from