Pinterest shows how retail media networks and data clean rooms collide at CES

Pinterest announced a new data clean room collaboration with LiveRamp and the grocer Albertsons at CES in Las Vegas, where the advertising industry continues to show its fascination with all things related to data and retail media.

Pinterest became the latest internet ad company to embrace the clean room concept, announcing its deal to use LiveRamp, the digital data and identity platform, as a third-party to be the intermediary for sharing insights with marketers like Albertsons. Albertsons is building a retail media network just like Walmart, Kroger, Target and other major stores, that leverage their relationships with customers, and the data that comes with it, to help brands advertise more effectively.

“We’re starting by partnering with retail media networks who often need custom options to report campaign effectiveness on a granular, brand-by-brand basis,” Bill Watkins, Pinterest’s chief revenue officer, said in the announcement.

Pinterest did not disclose what other retail media networks could use LiveRamp’s clean room technology. The idea is that Albertsons, which runs the Albertsons Media Collective, takes first-party data about consumers, such as sales information, and matches it with data about ad campaigns on Pinterest, using LiveRamp as the secured location to play with the data. “Our initial test pilot focuses on enabling closed-loop measurement,” said Kristi Argyilan, senior VP retail media, Albertsons Media Collective, in the announcement. “This partnership will ultimately provide our team a more holistic view of our customers’ digital footprint to unlock more advanced measurement capabilities.”

Now, data clean rooms are still evolving, and what constitutes a data clean room is an ongoing discussion. This week, Brian Lesser, CEO of InfoSum, the data tech provider, was at CES discussing the clean room craze with OMD at C Space, the marketer event within CES. “Within the clean room ecosystem, we have to be careful that we’re not lumping things together,” Lesser said in a phone interview. “Our perspective is a clean room has to be decentralized, it has to involve non-movement of data, and that data can never be commingled in a database.”

The Clorox Company and Wells Fargo executives joined OMD and InfoSum at CES to talk clean rooms. “Clean rooms have provided our businesses with the opportunity for closer collaboration, new opportunities, and the continued advancement of our retail media practice,” Doug Milliken, VP global brand development at The Clorox Company, said.

Meanwhile, this week Meta announced that it had a new marketing partner, IRI, the data and insights firm, which would help consumer products and other brands measure ad performance on Facebook and Instagram.

Pinterest’s data clean room deal and Meta’s work with IRI show how major internet ad platforms are evolving with the times. New rules around data-sharing and privacy, particularly coming out of Apple and Google, make it harder to track ad performance online. The industry is preparing for the ultimate death of cookies, with Google set to expire them in 2024. Apple has already killed off cookies, and other identifiers, which were useful in measuring ads. There has been a digital ad reckoning with the loss of direct data from sources such as Apple. Now, retailers like Albertsons see a path to use their data to assist advertisers through media networks. Clean rooms are proliferating as a way for ad networks and brands to reconcile data in a more secure environment than the open web. The entire ad industry is working on standards that could help ease the transition to data clean rooms.

Pinterest is a prime example of how internet ad platforms are adjusting to the new reality. In October, Pinterest also launched a conversions API—application programming interface—which is another way for brands to connect their data into Pinterest. Meta, TikTok, Snap and others have developed conversion APIs for the same reasons, so marketers can follow when an ad leads to a sale or other consumer event in their marketing goals.

“Every supply-side [advertising] marketplace has to think about the evolution of data collaboration tools,” Lesser said, adding that the industry is moving this way because of new governmental regulations and changes, such as cookie deprecation.