For over a decade, walled gardens have been a certainty for brands and advertisers : a large number of users willing to spend a good part of their time online, a great ability to personalize the content offer and target their audience, thanks to a deep knowledge of data, personal information and interests.
All this has translated into the possibility of creating effective and efficient advertising campaigns , so much so that on these channels the largest budgets have been invested on average, even for campaigns with conversion objectives.
But in recent years, the situation bahrain phone number data has changed. Walled gardens are gradually losing their appeal in the face of an open web that is gaining ground, proving more responsive to changes in privacy regulations, technological advances and user expectations.
But let’s proceed in order and before understanding the change underway, let’s start with the basics.
Walled Garden: What is it?
The term “walled garden” defines how accurate will the extracted data be? closed ecosystems in which data, content, and user interactions are confined within the platforms themselves.
Meta, Amazon, Google, TikTok: just refer to some of the big players attributable to this category to understand the characteristics of these systems.
Here, the owner companies choose the information, services or products to show to users, and all interactions take place in a controlled environment.
All this, as we anticipated, allows a very precise and centralized collection of data : every click, view of a product, interaction with a content or an advertisement is tracked, providing a rich source of information on user behavior .
With all the data collected, it bf leads is possible to create detailed user profiles to be used for profiled target audiences to be reached with targeted advertising, thus increasing the effectiveness of your advertising campaigns.
It is therefore no coincidence that, as reported by eMarketer, Meta and Google were the destination, in 2023, of more than 60% of global advertising spending. Advanced
profiling thanks to first-hand data, but not only: let’s start with a significant figure to also introduce some less positive aspects that concern walled gardens.
According to Statista, in 2014, walled gardens occupied 62% of the time spent online in the United States by an adult audience, a percentage that fell to 39% in 2023.
This figure is indicative of a progressive lack of interest on the part of the public in the use and enjoyment of walled gardens themselves . The reason is certainly attributable not only to a progressive loss of interest in the content offered, but also to the growing interest of users in their privacy.
One of the least transparent aspects of walled gardens is the management of the data itself. Users have little control over the first-party data and how it is used: the process by which each company manages the data
is, in effect, considered proprietary. Additionally, most platforms only allow advertisers to see aggregated metrics, leading to performance transparency issues.
Open web: the increasingly “real” alternative to walled gardens
It is precisely on this last point relating to the transparency of walled gardens that the open web strengthens its position as an effective channel for transmitting advertising campaigns . The term “open web” refers to the Internet ecosystem in which data and information are accessible without restriction. This includes websites, applications, digital properties where content can be shared and contributed by anyone and that do not refer to large players in the technology sector.
Recent studies of American consumer groups indicate that over 48% of them are more interested in spending more than an hour browsing resources on the open Web, while only 30% are more interested in walled gardens.
The combination of free, quality content, combined with an increasing focus on privacy among open garden sites, is attracting more and more users and, as a result, attracting the attention of brands and advertisers.