To push the digital ad targeting envelope, forget about digital marketing data ownership. The focus must be on data control, argues one industry veteran.

Yes, data ownership and data control are indeed inextricably linked, but it's only when Fortune 1000 and FTSE 100 advertisers (and/or their digital media agency partners) begin to look closely at how they can control the data collected via their rented (i.e., third party) ad management platforms that they realise there's little in the way of efficient incremental value that can be derived from third party data.

When this realisation is reached, the ownership question is easy to answer -- advertisers never really ever truly owned the data.

How can it be that advertisers don't own the data generated/collected by third party ad serving/tracking platforms (e.g., Google's DoubleClick DART, Micosoft's Atlas, ValueClick's Mediaplex, Aegis/Isobar's Bluestreak, etc.)? On a contractual basis, sure, they might. But look closely at the domain from which the data originates and is continually keyed to over the course of an advertiser's use of a given third party platform:

• Google's DoubleClick DART platform: The originating domain of the data is doubleclick.net (not the advertiser's domain). All cookies and cookie data are keyed/locked to the doubleclick.net domain. Cookies and cookie data are foundations to the vast volumes of data collected and manipulated for ad targeting and digital media investment performance measurement/analytics.
• Microsoft's Atlas platform: The originating domain of the data is atdmt.com (also not the advertiser's domain). Similar to the above, all cookies and cookie data are keyed/locked to the atdmt.com domain.
• ValueClick's Mediaplex MOJO platform: Same as the previous two.

So, what should advertisers do to ensure they both truly own and control the digital marketing data generated by the platforms that they directly use for the distribution and measurement of online marketing communications programmes? Similar to how many of them have their website analytics and eCRM platforms deployed today, advertisers should look to have their ad serving/tracking (including standard, rich, video display, paid search and all other forms of bought media) also deployed on a 'first party' basis, i.e., from their own domains.

It is only when advertisers serve and track their bought media on a (yes, encouragingly, also a privacy friendly) 'first party' basis that they can truly begin to create a data asset that is 100 per cent owned and controlled by the originating advertiser organisation. To be clear, serving and tracking on a first party basis means that the advertiser can read and write to its own cookie data as/when its ad campaigns encounter it, but new cookie data can also be created, (similar to how 3rd party platforms work, but the data in this construct is wholly owned and controlled by the advertiser). The advertiser organisation also enjoys the added benefit of knowing that only it and no one else can use their own domain cookie data, which is not the case with third party ad management data.

Currently, advertisers are creating cookie and vast database-driven assets that are keyed to/from domains that are completely foreign to their enterprises (albeit native to Google/DoubleClick, Microsoft, etc). The disconnects, the chasms, the gulfs, the permanent voids between these foreign data assets and advertisers' desires for greater digital marketing visibility and, ultimately, profitability is nothing less than gargantuan and, arguably, preventing industry innovation and business growth through more precise and productive online ad targeting.

Ok, enough for now. I’d love some thoughts, feedback, corrections, assumptions checks, pokes, prods, agreement, etc.

James Sandoval is founder and MD of Invizua.