iOS 17 Dissected: Insights From Wunderkind's VP of Product

Vern Tremble: Welcome to another episode of Individuality Unleashed. My name is Vern Tremble, Senior Director of Marketing Content and Comms at Wunderkind. Really excited to have you guys here with us again today. We're going to talk about all things performance marketing and unleashing individuality in your marketing. Today we're going to be chatting about the recent iOS 17 updates that were announced at WWD, and today we're joined by John Bates, our VP of product here at Wunderkind, and we're really excited to talk about these really important privacy updates that Google... Google? What company are we talking about today? John, what are we talking about today?

John Bates: Apple.

Vern Tremble: Apple.

John Bates: Apple.

Vern Tremble: Apple. Apples and bananas. I love to eat, eat apples and bananas. These updates have generated quite a buzz, John, in the industry, as you know, and we're here to break them down, talk about them today. So let's jump right in without further ado.

John Bates: All right.

Vern Tremble: Thank you for joining us, John.

John Bates: Thanks, Vern.

Vern Tremble: Can you give us an update on, well, just give us some details on who you are, what you like to do?

John Bates: My name is John Bates. I'm Vice President of Product Management here at Wunderkind. What do I like to do?

Vern Tremble: Yeah.

John Bates: I raise quail.

Vern Tremble: I dig it.

John Bates: Yeah, and other things, but primarily raise quail.

Vern Tremble: A little birdie told me something about a bear attack recently.

John Bates: Yeah. Actually a couple years ago I was attacked by a black bear in the mountains of Utah.

Vern Tremble: Okay.

John Bates: Yeah.

Vern Tremble: I'm glad you made it.

John Bates: I survived.

Vern Tremble: It turned out okay.

John Bates: And the bear survived, so everybody's okay.

Vern Tremble: Was it a baby black bear?

John Bates: No, it was a full- grown mama bear.

Vern Tremble: What were you doing?

John Bates: Hiking.

Vern Tremble: Okay. I'll let you-

John Bates: Hiking and I'm probably carrying some food. Shouldn't do that.

Vern Tremble: Yeah.

John Bates: Yeah.

Vern Tremble: I mean, were you carrying something that was very aromatic, I imagine?

John Bates: Yeah.

Vern Tremble: Cheeseburgers and stuff.

John Bates: Yeah, had Shake Shack up on the mountain.

Vern Tremble: Yeah, don't do that again. Well, I'm glad you survived and I'm glad you're here today to talk to us about these iOS 17 updates. I want to jump in right into the first question, and some of the recent iOS updates include, for as far as the product goes, as far as the phone goes, being able to send a call to voicemail, to see a live transcript of message, customization of what people see when you call, and the ability to create custom stickers from your own photos.

John Bates: Yeah.

Vern Tremble: And that's really fun, but what our audience wants to know and understand is what are some of the privacy updates that have been announced by Apple?

John Bates: So, Apple announced at the Worldwide Developer Conference three main updates for privacy. One is Intelligent Link Tracking Protection, which we'll dive more into, also private browsing protection and some app privacy improvements that they added as part of this release.

Vern Tremble: Interesting. You mentioned, you alluded to it, but what exactly is Intelligent Link Tracking and how does that work?

John Bates: Yeah, so Intelligent Link Tracking detects user identifiable tracking parameters in URLs and then removes them. So the value that it provides is it helps to prevent cross- site tracking and also prevents advertisers from tracking online activity without the user's consent. So, those links that are shared in mail or in messages or in Safari private browsing, all that tracking information is removed, but still the link will function as expected.

Vern Tremble: That's really interesting. I mean, there are a lot of implications to how that will impact marketers' abilities to do their job, or at least the way they've been doing their job over the past decade or so.

John Bates: Yeah.

Vern Tremble: Will Intelligent Link Tracking protection impact tracking in Google Analytics specific, oh, and Adobe?

John Bates: And Adobe, yeah. No, this update shouldn't impact tracking for revenue that shows up in your Google Analytics reports or within Adobe Analytics or within the broader Adobe Experience Cloud. Apple is only stripping user identifiable tracking, while other tracking parameters like campaign or source or medium, these are some of the ones that are very common for advertisers, those should remain preserved.

Vern Tremble: Okay. Interesting, interesting. Okay, so let's get down to brass tacks. How does it actually work? How does private browsing protection work?

John Bates: Yeah, so private browsing protection allows a user to lock their private browsing tabs when they're left idle, so when they're idle, they go sort of asleep in a sense. And so this feature ensures the tabs remain in a locked state until the user authenticates either with touch ID or their device's password to unlock them. So, things like automatic enabling and time limits and customization options, it's still unclear exactly how it's going to affect those types of features, but that's the high level.

Vern Tremble: So ultimately, we're not losing much except for the fact that we're putting more control back into the hands of the individual users.

John Bates: That's right, that's right.

Vern Tremble: Which is good, which is what they've been asking for. But I mean, it could be a bit of a dilemma for those folks and those marketers that rely on that data in order to drive identity and ultimately engagement segmentations with their cohorts.

John Bates: That's right.

Vern Tremble: Yeah. Okay, all right. I hope everyone's listening out there. We're trying to give you the skinny before everything shakes out. Will private browsing protection impact our functionality here at Wunderkind?

John Bates: It's unlikely to impact Wunderkind's functionality significantly. Most of the users visiting our clients' websites, they don't browse in private windows frequently. There's some small subset, but for the most part it's not very common. And while we will continue to monitor browser changes, this feature is not expected to affect the day- to- day activities of our clients' customers.

Vern Tremble: That's good to know. Excellent, excellent. Let's jump to the next question.

John Bates: All right.

Vern Tremble: What are the app privacy improvements announced by Apple?

John Bates: Right. So, app privacy improvements provide developers, so the people who are developing the mobile apps, with more information about the data practices for the third- party SDKs, or software developer kits, development kits, used within their apps. Oftentimes a mobile app may have multiple SDKs, or software development kits, that are leveraged within that mobile app. And so developers will have access to information that improves the integrity of the software supply chain, including supporting signatures for third- party SDKs. They'll also, Apple is going to publish an annual report that lists out those SDKs with the highest impact on privacy, on user privacy, and this will require them to include also a privacy manifest file, and that'll need to be signed by the original developer of the SDK.

Vern Tremble: Very interesting. So lots of opportunities.

John Bates: Yes.

Vern Tremble: As far as that.

John Bates: Yeah, and there's an impact to any of these third- party, these developers of these third- party SDKs that are being leveraged within mobile apps. There will be some work that needs to be done in order to comply.

Vern Tremble: Now, how will app privacy improvements impact Wunderkind specifically?

John Bates: So, Wunderkind, we are transparent with our clients and our clients' customers regarding what data we collect and how it's being used. These updates for the SDK, for example, like I said earlier, will require some updates from us for the SDK that we have in place, and so there will be some development to ensure that we are 100% in compliance with Apple's new policies.

Vern Tremble: Absolutely. That's fantastic, John. Is there anything else that you'd like to add as a part of this update to our listeners as far as iOS 17 updates, its implications around marketing as a whole?

John Bates: Yeah. Over the last, since even before like GDPR, if you're familiar with that privacy law in Europe, and since then there have been numerous regional privacy laws, we've just recently seen one signed in Texas, and this is the way that the digital world is going. Consent and privacy is increasingly important, and so it's important for brands to look at this not as a restriction, but to really embrace privacy- by- design principles and look for opportunities to be able to provide users greater consent, greater choice, and embrace that privacy journey with their users, to make sure that it's on their terms while also providing the value that you typically provide to your end customers.

Vern Tremble: I think that's fantastic, and I think what we should never lose sight of as marketers is that it's ultimately about creating bespoke and consent as far as delivering customed interactions from the brand to that customer ultimately. And one of the things that I want our audience to understand, or at least to research, is we recently released a consumer spending report where we surveyed thousands of consumers in the US and the UK to see how things like economic turmoil impacts their shopping behavior. And it's just a great resource of information ultimately to understand how your customers are shopping, how they're spending money, and it all goes down to just the very core, that you ultimately want to be delivering experiences that are relevant to your customers at their time of intent, and understanding privacy laws and all of those things is baked into that strategy.

John Bates: Absolutely, absolutely.

Vern Tremble: Fantastic. Well, John, is there anything else you'd like to share with the folks that are listening and watching today?

John Bates: Today, I don't have any. I'll have to leave you in suspense. No more quail or bear stories.

Vern Tremble: Ooh.

John Bates: Yeah, so maybe for next time, in the next episode.

Vern Tremble: I love that. I love cliffhangers. So that means that you're going to have to come back, and after this update is launched in September, we're going to talk about how the landscape shakes out with this change. And I'm sure-

John Bates: Absolutely.

Vern Tremble: ... it'llprobably take us a few months to gather some data, not only for us here at Wunderkind, but the market at large. But I'm really curious, and I'm sure the folks out there that are listening and watching, they're really interested in hearing how these changes will impact marketing as a whole.

John Bates: Yeah, and we're continuing to research and monitor that, and as we have more insight into the impact these changes make, we will be sharing those with everyone and the audience.

Vern Tremble: Awesome, awesome. Well, John, thank you so much for joining us. If you want more information about Wunderkind and the iOS 17 updates that are happening, please share this episode and also check out our website. You can learn more about Wunderkind and all that we provide as far as performance marketing at www. wunderkind. co. Again, I'm Vern Tremble. This is John Bates, VP of Product here at Wunderkind. This has been another episode of Individuality Unleashed.