A Journey into Server-Side Tag Management

It's been a year.

This week marks a full year with MetaRouter. Joining as a Sales Engineer at any organization (let alone a small startup) always introduces a new learning curve as you strive to gain the industry and product knowledge necessary in portraying the role of subject matter expert. Thus my journey began by expanding my experience in marketing technologies (gained from my tenure in the CDP space with SAP) to accommodate an introductory knowledge of advertising technology, and their associated tag management needs. I researched competing products, poured over Reddit threads, LinkedIn posts, analyst white papers, with the goal of internalizing not just MetaRouters core competencies, but that of the current market state as well. The result of said research brought me to yet another unfamiliar space.

You see, throughout the entirety of my career, the companies I have worked for all provided a product that addressed a clear, defined, and almost required need in the market. From the early days of AJAX frameworks with Backbase (now a baking software company), to identity management with Gigya (now part of SAP), then Customer Data Platforms at the same organization, each of my professional rotations had category alignment that while maybe not always clearly defined, at least had unsaturated demand. Server-side tag management or SSTM (where MetaRouter plays) is proving to be very different.

For starters, current conditions in the browser and ad-tech space align perfectly with the value-ad that SSTM promises to provide. The perfect storm of browser restrictions, and an educated public only now realizing the value of their digital identity is creating a cascade of self-feeding situations aligned perfectly to SSTM.

Browsers are becoming more restrictive.

Browsers are becoming more restrictive as core-level efforts to mitigate tracking and targeting efficacies become baked into the core browsing experience. Safari’s ITP features, Firefox’s equivalent ETP offering, and planned restrictions to Chrome to make way for Privacy Sandbox are all reducing the effectiveness of tracking pixels, and intrusive javascript code synonymous with ad-tech. Couple these restrictions with their corresponding forced deprecation of the third party cookie, and the data collection techniques of old (tags, pixels, etc.) begin to show their shelf-life.

These efforts by the browser providers then increase the focus on first-party data and customer provided identifying information. As the sensitivity of this newly captured data increases, so too does the need for visibility, control, and governance over said data. Finally, as the new normal for ad-tech and marketing strategies realigns around the known user, new tooling to take full advantage of this reduced (albeit more accurately defined) data-set begins to proliferate through the digital marketers tool-chest, thus increasing the number of consumers for our new digital gold.

Moving server-side.

From a technical standpoint, moving to server-side tag management seems like the obvious directional choice for any organization with their eye on these proverbial tea leaves.

Then there are the operational complexities associated with traditional client-side data capture (ie. tagging). Seeing tag management as a task driven primarily by digital marketing teams with limited technical expertise, Google set out to do the world a favor and provide a tool that allowed for tag configuration and deployment to be accomplished without the direct involvement of the development and engineering staff.

It’s a good product too.

So good in fact the website w3techs.com stated that Google Tag Manager is used by 49.3% of all websites which equates to 99.7% of all websites that use a tag manager.

That’s honestly one of the most wild statistics I’ve ever looked at, and I’m a Tiger Woods fan.

But client-side tag management doesn’t impact the previously mentioned evolution of browser tracking. It’s merely a tool for increasing operational efficiency of digital marketing teams and their tooling strategies.

(As I write this I am realizing perhaps I should have started here first)

Gootle Tag Manager.

While Google Tag Manager (GTM) accomplishes the tag management task well, it’s goal of simplifying the tag deployment task has also lead to notoriously bad habits associated with governance that often results in massive proliferation of client-side code that deteriorates page performance, and potentially introduces fragility into a sites functionality. This oftentimes leads to a governance over-correction where only engineering is provided access to GTM (thereby eliminating a core value proposition of democratizing tag management). Sit in with any enterprise organization using the tool, or peruse some GTM-centric threads and you will not be wanting for tales of frustration and woe.

Again, not knocking GTM. I’m simply calling out challenges (real or perceived) that SHOULD be fueling a movement towards a server-side alternative.

So why then is SSTM adoption still so low, and why are organizations not calling me non-stop for quotes?

To be continued...

It’s getting a bit late here, so stay tuned for a follow-up.

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