The General Data Protection Regulation is reacting to cases where user data was misused, such as the one involving Cambridge Analytica. Now that this new legislation has been implemented, it impacts all industries that collect and process user data, including digital marketing. This article explores the changes that this regulation has brought about.
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The General Data Protection Regulation aims to give individuals more control over the usage of their personal data, and it went into effect on May 25th, 2018. Considering that data-based personalization and retargeting, which were previously essential instruments in digital marketing, were against the GDPR, businesses have begun to focus on SEO instead.
Easier Outbound Link-Building
According to GDPR, companies now have to clearly state the privacy policy on their website. As most of them chose to do this through links on the most important pages, it has also brought advantages for the SEO teams, as it gave them a convenient way to control crawlers to-and-from the pages.
Security as a Ranking Factor
It is thought that the websites that are in with the GDPR will be ranked higher on the SERPS by Google, but there hasn’t been any official information regarding this yet. However, as Google has always been committed to make the internet a safer place, it is obvious that their actions are in sequence with the GDPR.
Looking at the way Google encouraged the adoption of HTTPS, it won’t be long until website owners also begin to implement the privacy protection measures required by the GDPR.
Difficulties with Geo-Targeting
The GDPR expands the notion of personal data, by adding to the list information such as IP addresses, mobile device identifiers, geo-location, biometric data, economic status etc.
As for geo-targeting information such as mobile identifiers and geo-location was used, it is now harder to use this technique for SEO purposes. In order to be able to continue to use this information for that purposes, websites now have to require permission from users.
Alternative Personalization Models
As GDPR has been applied, websites now have to ask the users for permission to handle their data, and considering recent privacy scandals, the majority of them might actually not give their permission. Therefore, most of the users will receive generic SERPs. As another consequence, standard personalization models are not considered to be as useful as they used to be.
But as the search queries people use are personalized no matter what, the websites are still able to receive personalized traffic search, by creating SEO content based on the users’ search.
Reduced Keyword Cannibalization
Keyword cannibalization appears as a result of the overlap between the goals of paid traffic and organic traffic, especially in brand-bidding and retargeting.
The good thing is that now, due to the fact that retargeting is against GDPR, organic traffic channels (such as search engine optimization) aren’t exposed to keyword cannibalization anymore.
Moreover, now that the effectiveness of paid traffic is decreasing, companies can invest more in search engine optimization techniques and other organic techniques that were previously ignored because of the lack of the necessary budget.
Only Time Will Tell
GDPR represents just another change for SEO, and it will not be long until it adapts to the new guidelines, as search engine optimization techniques has been in constant change since search engines became a common medium for finding information online.
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If you are interested to find out more about GDPR and marketing strategies, visit our website at HealthConnexions. For more information on the subject, contact us at info(at)healthconnexions.com.